Why are Kashmiris rising up against Pakistani state?

Kashmir is divided between India and Pakistan partly along the Neelum River

What is happening in Kashmir?

A mass movement in Pakistan-controlled Kashmir—known as Azad Kashmir—is struggling for greater democratic rights in the midst of a rigged election for the regional parliament.

Thousands of supporters of the civil rights group, the Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC), gathered in Rawalakot, about 70 miles from the capital, Islamabad. They planned to march to Muzaffarabad, the regional capital.

But paramilitary police used tear gas and live rounds to disperse them. They killed several protesters, bringing the death toll to more than 40 since widespread protests began.

“They have killed and wounded countless of our brothers,” Sohaib Khan told Al Jazeera News.

“They are worse than the Zionists. This ruthless government has no shame. This road is filled with blood.”

According to JAAC, at least 25 people were killed by police fire on Monday and five more on Tuesday.

Why are Kashmiris protesting?

The movement is demanding change to the current electoral system. It wants to reallocate parliamentary seats away from those reserved for Kashmiris living elsewhere in the country to those who actually live in the territory.

Protesters rightly say the current system allows the big parties that dominate Pakistan nationally to also dominate Kashmir.

Some 12 of the 53 seats in the regional assembly are reserved for people whose families long ago fled to Azad Kashmir from the pogroms in 1940s India.

But many of those families no longer live in the region.

Yet those 12 seats are often used to prop up parties in government that few people in Kashmir voted for.

The dispute escalated in early June after the regional Supreme Court ruled that the non-resident seats cannot be abolished without a constitutional amendment passed by the Pakistan parliament.

But the main parliamentary parties have every interest in maintaining the system as it is.

Who are the JAAC?

Founded in 2023, the JAAC is a coalition of small business owners, students and civil society activists that began by demanding that the state subsidise food prices for local people.

A year later, it organised a six-day protest which combined sit-ins, enforced business closures and street demonstrations. JAAC demanded that the national and regional governments act to lower wheat, flour and electricity prices.

Protesters said Kashmiris should get electricity at cost since the local Mangla Dam generates it.

And the regional state responded to the protests by jailing movement leaders and sending in armed police, leading to fierce clashes.

The central government gave in to some JAAC demands—but not on electricity prices.

JAAC often says that its dispute is not with the leaders of Pakistan but with its regional government, which it rightly derides as corrupt.

That’s why its most recent campaign has focused on the rigged election system.

Are conditions any better in India-controlled Kashmir?

No. Indian security forces have imposed curfew after curfew in the territory since the far right BJP government abolished Kashmir’s self-governing status in 2019.

Police have rounded up thousands of overwhelmingly young Muslims, accusing them of being “terrorists.” The state regularly cuts communications and seals off whole towns.

Journalists critical of the situation are often targeted for arrest and are unable to file their reports.

Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, as well as local bodies such as the Jammu and Kashmir Coalition of Civil Society, report regular instances of systemic torture and severe human rights abuses in the territory.

These have included injuries sustained by mechanical crushing, electric shock and sexual abuse.

Why do India and Pakistan fight over Kashmir?

Both the Indian and Pakistani states covet Kashmir for its strategic importance, not because they care about the wishes of the people who live there.

The territory is not only a border between the two, but the area also has a border with China. That’s why it is one of the most militarised areas in the world.

Pakistan and India have so far fought four wars over Kashmir. Both are nuclear powers.

Pakistan has backed Kashmiri freedom fighters who have attacked Indian troops along the Line of Control that separates the territory.

And the Indian state uses its big guns to pound villages on the Azad Kashmir side.

Both states seek advantage over the other, with Kashmiris as pawns in their game.

How was Kashmir divided?

In 1947, when Britain partitioned India to create Pakistan, the state of Jammu and Kashmir was ruled by a Hindu prince but had a Muslim majority.

As its ruler prevaricated over which state to join, Pakistani guerrillas crossed the border, and Indian troops invaded to repel them.

After this, the territory was divided between them and, to a lesser extent, China.

The borders were drawn arbitrarily and without consultation, with families split apart and conflict locked in.

The Indian state offered Kashmiris limited independence in the part it controlled. This, it said, was the prelude to a referendum that would decide its future. But such a vote never came.

Instead, India used massive repression, which in turn fuelled armed resistance.

What do socialists say should happen now?

We want a reunified Kashmir, but we side with neither Pakistan nor India.

We are against the Indian state which persecutes Muslims in Indian-controlled Kashmir. We demand full freedom of expression and association and the return of autonomy to Kashmir.

And we are against the Pakistani state as it shoots down protesters demanding democratic reforms and uses Kashmir to conduct a proxy war against India.

Instead, we demand that the Kashmiri people themselves determine their future.

We agree with many on the Kashmiri left who want a future free from both Pakistan and India. They demand that the vote on independence that the United Nations promised in 1948 takes place.

The solution for Kashmir today is to rip up all those borders and allow the people to make their own choices about how they wish to live.

But in the context of such fierce great-power rivalry, only a revolutionary movement in both India and Pakistan could make that a real possibility.