The recent assault on the Editor of New Age and Editors’ Council President Nurul Kabir, and the mob attacks on the offices of the widely circulated Bangla daily Prothom Alo, and leading English-language publication Daily Star, in particular, mark a serious and deadly escalation in the ongoing cycle of violence against and intimidation of the media in Bangladesh.

The Guild has also noted with the gravest concern reports of death threats on social media against media persons, and has called on the Muhammad Yunus-led interim government in Bangladesh to immediately ensure the physical safety and well-being of journalists, and for quick action against the perpetrators of such violence.

These attacks constitute a clear violation of media freedom in South Asia and are an attempt to silence independent media voices and constrain civic discourse. The Guild calls on the authorities in Bangladesh and elsewhere to ensure that immediate action is taken to ensure that the media is allowed to function in an atmosphere free of threats, intimidations and violence.

The statement has been issued by the Guild president, Sanjay Kapoor, general secretary Raghavan Srinivasan and general secretary, Teresa Rehman.

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Academy chairman Resul Pookutty confirmed that the films will be screened as per schedule. “We are going ahead with all the film screenings as scheduled. We will fight this out. We want the IFFK and its spirit to be saved,” Pookutty told Onmanorama.

For the first time in the history of the prestigious film festival, the Central government had insisted on MEA sanction to screen a select bunch of films at IFFK. The pending censorship exemption for 19 films has prompted cancellations and schedule revisions, sparking protests.

On Tuesday, December 16, four films were given exemption, but clearance for 15 films was put on hold. Academy officials said the films for which clearance is being withheld include old classics, restored versions, Palestinian movies, Sri Lankan films, and previous winners at the IFFK.

In the first instance, on December 16, Marian Alexander Baby, the general secretary of the state’s ruling Communist Party of India (Marxist) told the media that The Union Information and Broadcasting Ministry has denied the 2025 International Film Festival of Kerala permission to screen 19 films. The list includes films about Palestine. The event in Thiruvananthapuram began on December 12 and will conclude on December 19.

According to rules it is reported that, films without a censorship certificate require an exemption from I&B to be screened at film festivals. The procedure outlined is that festival organisers submit applications with a synopsis and get an exemption certificate. IFFK organisers said they submitted applications with film summaries 10 days prior to the start of the festival. Pookutty had earlier told Onmanorama that he had reached out to Minister for External Affairs S Jaishankar to find a solution.

Four films given exemption after an initial ban:  Beef, Eagles of Republic, Heart of the Wolf, once upon a time in Gaza. Palestine 36, an Arabic and English language movie, was the inaugural film of the event. On December 12, at the inauguration ceremony, Kerala’s Cultural Affairs Minister Saji Cherian had spoken about the state’s support for the Palestinian cause. Palestinian Ambassador to India Abdallah M Abu Shawesh was a guest at the event.

At the inauguration of the festival on December 12, while paying tribute to director Shaji N Karun, who was associated with the festival until his death in April 2025, Cherian also said that the festival was a platform that “resists fascism and autocracy while celebrating freedom of speech and creative expression”. Reported Scroll.in.

Films to be screened without censorship exemption

1. A Poet: Unconcealed Poetry
2. All That’s Left of You
3. Bamako
4. Battleship Potemkin
5. Clash
6. Palestine 36
7. Red Rain
8. Riverstone
9. The Hour of The Furnaces
10. Tunnels: Sun In the Dark (Địa Đạo: Mặt Trời Trong Bóng Tối)
11. Yes
12. Flames
13. Timbuktu
14. Wajib
15. Santosh

Background

Among the other films that were denied permission are A Poet: Unconcealed Poetry, Bamako, director Sergei Eisenstein’s 1925 classic Battleship Potemkin, Spanish film Beef, Clash, Eagles of The Republic, Heart of The Wolf, Red Rain, Riverstone, The Hour of The Furnaces, Tunnels: Sun In The Dark (Địa Đạo: Mặt Trời Trong Bóng Tối), Flames, Timbuktu, Wajib and Santosh.

Battleship Potemkin and director Abderrahmane Sissako’s 2006 docudrama Bamako have been widely shown at film festivals in India. Sissako was honoured by the IFFK with a Lifetime Achievement Award this year. MA Baby, General Secretary of the ruling CPI-M said that the film Beef had been denied permission “ostensibly because of its name, even though it has nothing to do with food choices”. The former minister said that the permissions being denied to screen the films was an “absurd and lunatic attempt to derail IFFK” and the “latest example of the neo-fascist tendencies of the extreme authoritarian rule” under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh chief Mohan Bhagwat.The RSS is the parent organisation of the BJP. “Artists, filmmakers and all democratic-minded citizens must raise their voices against this disgraceful move,” he said.

The Democratic Youth Federation of India, the youth organisation affiliated to the CPI(M), held a protest at one of the main venues of the film festival.

Meanwhile Veteran filmmaker and Dadasaheb Phalke awardee, Adoor Gopalakrishnan, commenting on the attempted censorship of 19 films at the IFFK, including Battleship Potemkin, Beef and some Palestinian film was scathing in his comment, “This shows the ignorance of those making these decisions. Battleship Potemkin is an important study on the grammar of cinema.

VIDEO | Kerala: Veteran filmmaker and Dadasaheb Phalke awardee Adoor Gopalakrishnan, commenting on the hold on the screening of 19 films at IFFK, including Battleship Potemkin, Beef, and some Palestinian films, says, “It shows the ignorance of those making these decisions.… pic.twitter.com/TOCQCiElS9

— Press Trust of India (@PTI_News) December 15, 2025

Kerala Minister for Cultural Affairs Saji Cherian has directed State Chalachitra Academy to screen all the films at IFFK @iffklive, including the remaining 15 films for which the Union I&B ministry has not yet provided censor exemption.

Kerala Minister for Cultural Affairs Saji Cherian has directed State Chalachitra Academy to screen all the films at IFFK @iffklive , including the remaining 15 films for which the Union I&B ministry has not yet provided censor exemption.

— S.R.Praveen (@myopiclenses) December 16, 2025

Kerala refuses to bow down before the whimsical rulings of Central Board of FilmCertification that denied exemption for 19 films including classic film of Battleship Potemkin in a bid to disrupt the film festival. CM declares that all the19 films will be screened at IFFK .#IFFK

— Thomas Isaac (@drthomasisaac) December 16, 2025

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On Friday December 12, 2025, the Union Cabinet cleared HECI Bill under changed name the Viksit Bharat Shiksha Adhikshan (VBSA) Bill 2025. The Bill has been tabled in the Winter Session. The press conference of over two dozen organisations including the All India Forum for the Right to Education (AIFRTE) has demanded that the Bill, which will redefine Government’s commitment towards public funded higher education and therefore, its purpose, is referred to the Standing Committee for wider consultation.

Reminding the public that the VBSA Bill 2025 is a revived version of a similar HECI Bill 2018, a draft of which was released in June 2018. The revision is largely around renaming the Commission and Councils under it. The Draft HECI Bill 2018 had received more than a lakh unfavourable responses from concerned citizens, students’ and teachers’ associations, parliamentarians and other stakeholders. The public opposition to the Bill was so strong and vocal that the then-NDA government was forced to shelve it, and let it fade from public memory in these seven years before bringing it back.  The draft VBSA Bill 2025 was released on the portal of Members of Parliament on 14.12.2025. The feedback from the stakeholders on the draft HECI Bill 2018 seems to have been ignored completely. Pointing out that the VBSA Bill 2025 will simultaneously repeal the University Grants Commission (UGC) Act 1956, All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) Act, 1987 and National Council for Teacher Education (NCTE) Act, 1993. The draft VBSA Bill 2025 was released on the portal of Members of Parliament on 14.12.2025. The feedback from the stakeholders on the draft HECI Bill 2018 seems to have been ignored completely.

Some of the most pressing concerns about the VBSA Bill 2025 are:

1. Delinking of funding and regulation: No Council under the Commission has been set for funding of HEIs. The VBSA Bill is to make the Ministry of Education (MoE) responsible for disbursing grants. This will make the process of grant allocation more bureaucratic, arbitrary, and subject to political considerations. By delinking the function of policy-making from the allocation of financial resources, the proposed Bill will use ‘public funding’ as a reward or punishment for ideological It will also heighten hierarchies between different tiers of institutions (Central and state, general and professional, scientific and technical, research and vocational, metropolitan and rural).

2. Composition of members: The composition of the VBSA Bill 2025 signals a takeover of higher education by the officials of the Central government. 10 out of the 12 members of the Commission are either direct recruits of or nominated “experts” by the Central government. Teachers are reduced to just two in number, which is absolutely unacceptable in a body that is to determine the standards and quality of higher education in the country. Both teacher representatives from state higher education institutions will, by virtue of being ‘nominees’ of the Central government, will also likely be political appointments. The composition of the commission does not also reflect the diversity of the country and gives no representation to marginalised groups like SCs, STs, OBCs, women, transpersons, persons with disabilities, and minorities.

3. Centralised regulatory regime: The regulatory provisions of the Bill — grant of authorisation, graded autonomy, and ordering closure of institutions — will install a heavily centralised regime that will lead to punitive annual audit, wastage of time and resources, greater job insecurity for teachers, massive fee hikes, and This will cause students and their family’s great unrest and anxiety. Finally, the fact that the VBSA Bill will have overriding effect over all previous legislation has serious consequences for the nation’s federal character.

4. Complete disregard for diversity: With regards to the setting of standards for higher education, a ‘one size fits all’ model can never succeed. The diversity of this country, and the fact that higher education is still expanding to various sections and particularly rural sectors of society, demands a regulator that is socially responsive and geared towards social justice. The HECI Bill instead aims at downsizing higher education, and completely ignores questions of equity and access. It threatens the closure of ‘underperforming’ public-funded institutions, which are anyway reeling under decades of policy neglect through lack of infrastructure, faculty and other physical-intellectual

5. Threat to autonomy of institutions and principle of federalism: The VBSA Bill puts an end to the autonomy of institutions of higher education from government control. Every regulation relating to standards made by the Commission has to have the prior approval of the Central government. This not only violates the constitutional character of education as part of the Concurrent list, but also leaves the vast majority of the country’s higher educational landscape – run and aided by state governments – in a political tussle with the ruling party at the Centre. It will also encourage the use of regulations as a means to stifle freedom of speech, thought, and dissenting opinion in higher educational institutions. An atmosphere of forced obedience does not encourage meaningful improvements in society or in the state of knowledge.

6. Heightening the crises caused by NEP 2020: It is being argued that the setting up of the VBSA is in alignment with the vision proposed by NEP 2020. Colleges and universities across the country are currently struggling under the weight of the NEP’s vision – which has skewed syllabi and curricula with diluted content, delayed admissions processes through a compromised common university entrance test (CUET) and left seats unfilled, increased costs of undergraduate education with an extra year of college but zero value addition under the four year programme, contractualized teaching positions through lopsided teaching workload across semesters, slashed public funding through proposals for college mergers and institutional loans from the Higher Education Financing Agency (HEFA), reduced the capacity of the research sector and curtailed research fellowships. Under such circumstances, the introduction of another disastrous reform move through the establishment of HECI will be the last nail in the coffin of Indian higher education.

Post-Independence, the historic purpose of nurturing Higher education through public spending has been to enable progressive social and material transformation that will eventually result in greater Equity between various interest-groups in Society. The Constitution had envisaged education as a public good – a means to ensure dignity and upward mobility to individuals and for strengthening the democracy. Education was seen as domain to be shared by the Centre and States. The VBSA Bill 2025 is a structural change, which will lead to extreme centralisation and commercialisation and privatisation of public funded HEIs as they will be pushed to be self-reliant.

As stakeholders, we appeal that the Bill to be referred to the Standing Committee so that teachers, students, and educationists are given enough opportunity to present their case.

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The interesting part was that in the front of the processions were bullock carts in keeping with the tradition , unlike some other processions where they use mechanized vehicles. This makes our streets so lively, of course mostly we have bad traffic jams and things are bad. But these old traditions lend much colour to the otherwise drab lives of common people. In the West they have given up these traditions long ago, the streets are too sanitized, too orderly.

A Sandal Procession (Sandal Sharif) is a Sufi Islamic ritual where devotees carry fragrant sandalwood (Sandal/Chandan) paste in plates, often with incense, to anoint the tombs (dargahs) or walls of mosques belonging to Muslim saints during Urs (death anniversary) celebrations. It is a display of devotion, purity, and unity, sometimes integrated with local traditions, there is Hindu Muslim unity, the Mahim police station takes the lead in the organization.

Some people may scoff at the idea animals on the streets which they think should be reserved for their cars, forgetting that motor cars are big polluters and impose such heavy social costs.

With all the faults, traditionally Indians have a good relationship with domestic animals, on some days the bullocks are worshipped decorated, not burdened on the day of Pola in Maharashtra and there are similar days in other states.

Westerners with all their sophistication in certain matters had had a pretty unfriendly, even hostile relationship with animals like in bull fighting which involve so much violence and though horse racing appeals to so many people, it involves much cruelty to the animal which we never get to see.

As coincidence would have it I saw a fairly interesting film at Alliance Francaise earlier this week which showed a woman, the protagonist, who realizes the need to treat the bulls kindly in bull sports.

In the film Animal, the first local woman to enter the ring with the young men who tempt, chase and are chased by local bulls starts to see things from the bulls’ perspective as bulls go “rogue” and started goring and stamping the locals in the dark of night, long after the audience — mostly tourists — for some events has left.

The Camargue style of bullfighting is non-fatal, a lot less bloody and far and away a more humane and “even” contest and is thus referred to as “bull racing” by the locals, who enter the ring — basically unarmed and on foot — and try to snatch cash-prize tokens attached to the bull’s scalp.
But as experts point every year, approximately 180,000 bulls are killed in bullfights around the world, with many more killed or injured in bull fiesta events. Bullfighting is already banned by law in many countries including Argentina, Canada, Colombia, Cuba, Denmark, Italy and the United Kingdom.
Although legal in Spain, some Spanish cities, have outlawed the practice of bull fighting.

(From Vidyadhar Date’s page on Facebook)

Mahim Durgah, a Sufi Saint and a Mumbai police ritual

A colonial practice, this ritual of Mumbai’s top police officers walking to durgahs with an offering every year has continued –despite the serious fissures between the police administration and Mumbai’s (then Bombay’s Muslim minority) during the post-Babri Masjid demolitions in December 1992 and January 1993. Sections of an otherwise acclaimed police force were accused, and found by the Justice BN Srikrishna Commission of being guilty of deep anti-minority biases. The practice of officers offering the ceremonial chadar has continued and this year. Each year, as Urs begins at Mahim Dargah, in December, a scene plays out on the streets of Mumbai with a police band at the front, uniformed officers behind and senior police officers carrying a green chadar as they walk towards the 600-year-old shrine of Hazrat Makhdoom Ali Mahimi.

After Independence, while most government departments quietly shed the ceremonial and religious practices they had inherited from the British era a few exceptions endured, particularly at dargahs such as Mahim, and Dongri’s Rehman Shah Ba.

What is the legacy of the Mahim Dargah?

The Indian Express reports that the Mahim Dargah of Hazrat Makhdoom Ali Mahimi is one of Mumbai’s oldest and most historically revered Islamic shrines, with a lineage going back over 600 years. Long before Mumbai grew into a metropolis, this coastal dargah functioned as a spiritual anchor for sailors, traders, scholars and communities along the western coast. The saint himself was of Arab descent; his ancestors are believed to have arrived in India around AD 860 (AH 252) after fleeing the persecution of Hajjaj ibn Yusuf, the much-feared governor of Basra. Born roughly five centuries later in India, Makhdoom Ali Mahimi received rigorous training in Islamic law and theology and was eventually appointed the faqih, or law officer, for the Muslim community of Mahim. He passed away in 1431, and soon after his death, the local community built a mosque and shrine in his honour. Over the centuries, that shrine evolved into one of Mumbai’s most significant pilgrimage centres.

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The Supreme Court also directed a special court to conduct trial on a day-to-day basis to record the statements of the nine remaining witnesses. Langa has been ordered to extend full cooperation with the proceedings and seek no adjournment on the ground that his petition seeking the case be quashed is pending. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has been directed to file a status report on compliance with these directions. The matter has been listed for further consideration on January 6.

Langa had been arrested by the Gujarat Police last year in a case involving allegations of Goods and Services Tax (GST) fraud and was subsequently booked in multiple cases. The ED later registered a case against him under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). It was senior advocate Kapil Sibal appeared for Langa. Opposing the plea, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta alleged that Langa had extorted money, claiming that threats were made to publish adverse material if payments were not made. “A journalist is found to be extorting money… We want to file an additional counter,” Mehta told the court.

Sibal objected to the move, stating that the ED was seeking to change its stand. He argued that allegations of “Rs 68-crore fraud” were exaggerated, asserting that “it is not even Rs 68 lakh.” Sibal further pointed out that no charge sheet had been filed in the predicate offence forming the basis of the PMLA case. “I have been in custody since October 2024. For what offence? It is not murder,” he submitted, calling allegations of influencing witnesses “shocking”.

Sibal also alleged that crucial documents had not been furnished to the defence, stating that there was no supplementary complaint and that the prosecution could not “have it both ways”. Finally after heated exchanges in court and taking note of the fact that only nine witnesses remain to be examined, the court granted interim bail. During a brief exchange after the order, Mehta reiterated the allegation of extortion, to which Sibal responded by suggesting that industrialists were targeting journalists. Mehta denied any political motive, stating that the prosecution was acting purely in a professional capacity. When the exchange escalated, the CJI intervened, stressing that the trial must not be delayed and cautioning Langa against misusing his position as a journalist. Sibal responded that any such violation would be grounds for cancellation of bail.

The Gujarat high court had denied bail to Langa following which he had approached the Supreme Court.

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NBDSA’s review of the broadcast revealed that the anchor relied on stereotypes about Bengali-speaking Muslims—particularly the Miya community—misrepresented demographic and political data, and even connected the protest song to an entirely unrelated rape case with no causal link. The Authority noted that this narrative expansion could not be justified as news reporting; rather, it demonstrated that the anchor “had a particular agenda in mind.” By weaving isolated incidents into a communal narrative and introducing ideas like a “Jihadi syndicate” or a conspiracy to undermine Hindu traditions, the programme violated the NBDSA’s Code of Ethics and Specific Guidelines for Anchors, which bar generalisation, sensationalism, and the vilification of any community.

In its direction, the Authority has ordered Times Now Navbharat to remove all “offending portions” from the programme and submit a modified version within seven days. It also instructed that the order be circulated to all member broadcasters and uploaded on the NBDA website and in the next Annual Report. For CJP, the decision marks a significant regulatory affirmation of its consistent efforts to challenge communalised media narratives. For the wider media landscape, the order serves as a critical reminder that the authority to question and critique cannot be exercised through distortion, stereotype, or the manufacturing of communal fear.

The Complaint: CJP flags communal narrative, distortion, and fear-mongering

CJP’s complaint dated September 9, 2024 focused on a Times Now Navbharat programme titled: “Desh Ka Mood Meter: सनातन संस्कृति…कट्टरपंथियों के लिए सॉफ्ट टारगेट? | CM Himanta Biswa Sarma News” that aired on 2 September 2024. The show revolved around the arrest of Altaf Hussain, a Bengali-speaking Muslim singer from Assam, who had released a protest song highlighting discrimination against the Miya community. Following his arrest, the Chief Minister og Assam made a Facebook Live appearance calling the song “an attack” and alleging an attempt to “change Bihu into Miya Bihu”.

The Times Now Navbharat broadcast then used these remarks to spin a sweeping communal narrative.

CJP pointed out that the anchor:

• Presented the incident as part of a nationwide conspiracy against Hindu culture—linking Assam, Kerala, and Kashmir in a manufactured war-like narrative.
• Used dangerous phrases such as “Jihadi syndicate”, communal conspiracy, and “invasion”.
• Equated the term ‘Miya’ with illegal Bangladeshi immigrants, misrepresenting an entire community.
• Suggested that Muslims controlled 30 Vidhan Sabha seats and posed a demographic threat.
• Linked an isolated rape case to an entire community to insinuate collective criminality.
• Wove these disparate incidents into an overarching narrative that Hindus were under “attack”.

CJP also highlighted how the broadcast manipulated imagery, language, and tone to sharply polarise viewers and turn a cultural controversy into a nationwide Hindu-Muslim conflict.

The complete report may be read here.

Broadcaster’s Defence: ‘We only reported facts’

Times Now Navbharat denied all allegations:

• It claimed the show was only reporting the arrest and the Chief Minister’s views.
• It argued that it had differentiated between “Miya” Muslims and indigenous Assamese Muslims.
• It insisted that the depiction of demographics and electoral influence was factual.
• It refuted claims of fear-mongering, stating that the anchor was merely posing uncomfortable questions in the national interest.
• It accused the complainant of “selectively quoting snippets”.

Hearing Before NBDSA: CJP demonstrates how the anchor crafted a false national conspiracy

At the hearing held on February 22, 2025, CJP meticulously demonstrated that:

• The anchor’s opening monologue itself framed the entire show as an attack on Hindu festivals “from Assam to Kerala”.
• This was not reportage but a deliberate, pre-set narrative.
• The anchor bundled unrelated issues—the singer’s arrest, a rape case, Onam interpretations, and alleged temple name changes—to craft a false story of Hindus under siege.
• The rhetoric used was not factual journalism but fear-inducing, divisive, and ethically unsound.

NBDSA’s Findings: “Anchor had an agenda in mind”

• Reporting the arrest itself was legitimate—but the anchor went far beyond facts

The Authority noted that reporting the arrest and discussing the Chief Minister’s criticism of the song was well within the channel’s rights. But the problem was everything that followed.

• “The narrative built by the anchor went much beyond that”

NBDSA found that:

• The anchor introduced communal stereotypes, generalisations, and insinuations against a specific community.
• He linked the singer’s song to an unrelated rape case, despite “no causal connection”.
• He used the incident as an opportunity to push an agenda-driven narrative.

• “The anchor had a particular agenda in mind”

This is one of the strongest observations NBDSA has made in recent orders. The Authority stated that the anchor appeared to seize the incident as a chance to craft a pre-decided, communal storyline.

“In the process, the anchor brings a stereotype in respect of a particular community which could clearly have been avoided. The anchor also connects the song with an incident of rape, though there was no causal connection and the two things arc altogether separate and distinct. It seems the anchor had a particular agenda in mind and got this opportunity to build his narrative, bearing in mind the said agenda. It is this generalisation which falls foul of the BDSA’s Code of Ethics and Broadcasting Standards as well as the Specific Guidelines for Anchors conducting Programmes including Debates.”

• This violates the Code of Ethics and the Specific Guidelines for Anchors

NBDSA held that the broadcast breached:

• requirements of impartiality,
• fairness,
• neutrality,
• and the mandates for non-sensational, non-communal reporting.

The Direction: Remove offending content, re-publish edited version

NBDSA issued a clear directive:

• Times Now Navbharat must modulate the programme by removing all offending portions.
• The broadcaster must submit the edited link to NBDSA within 7 days.
• The order will be circulated internally to all NBDA member channels, editors, and legal heads.
• It will be hosted publicly on NBDA’s website and included in the Authority’s Annual Report.

Why this order matters

For CJP: It validates months of rigorous, evidence-driven media accountability work and strengthens future interventions against hate speech and communal propaganda.

For media regulation: The order sets a clear precedent that anchors cannot camouflage communal narratives under the guise of “uncomfortable questions”.

For newsroom ethics: The order draws a sharp line between reporting and communal agenda-setting, holding anchors accountable—not just for factual accuracy but for narrative construction.

For public discourse: It recognises how dangerous and corrosive it is when mainstream news links isolated crimes to entire communities or constructs conspiracies around minorities.

The complete order may be read here.

Image Courtesy: Youtube.com

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This CCG visit came in the wake of the Union Territory legislative assembly elections and Operation Sindoor which followed a terrorist attack at Pahalgam, and the havoc caused by the heavy rains, floods, landslides in Jammu division but also in Kashmir. These major significant incidents that followed one after the other have taken a huge psychological and economic toll on people and communities in both regions of Jammu-Kashmir. The visit also came at a time when the statehood promised by the Centre at an “appropriate time” still seemed a distant dream despite an elected government, albeit a non-Bhartiya Janata Party led one, in place and dyarchy continued to prevail in Jammu and Kashmir — the chief minister still did not enjoy full powers and the Lieutenant Governor controlled much of the administrative and law and order structure.

During its most recent visit, the CCG members met leaders of political parties (including former Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah, current Chief Minister Omar Abdullah and Deputy Chief Minister Surinder Kumar Choudhary of the National Conference, Mohammad Yusuf Tarigami of the Communist Party of India (Marxist),Tariq Hamid Karra President of the J&K State Pradesh Congress Committee, G. A. Mir, Secretary General and Nizam Uddin Bhat, Congress MLA and chief whip from Bandipora, Kashmir’s foremost religious cleric and political leader Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, Kashmiri Pandit leader Sanjay Ticku, civil society leaders, representatives of the Kashmir Chamber of Commerce and Industry, student activists from the J&K Students’ Association and journalists.

In sum, the CCG after its end October 2025 visit found that the situation on the ground, especially in the Kashmir Valley is much farther from the truth than the one presented by the Government of India or its media in Delhi.

Sullen Silence, Building anti-India sentiment

From the Jammu-Kashmir Report of the CCG:

The overwhelming sense in Srinagar was that of sullen silence. During the meetings with all those that the CCG met from civil society, they realised that the alienation had deepened, resentment and anger against the Central Government had increased but it was also partly directed now against the popularly elected Omar Abdullah government.

Different sections of Kashmiri society seemed angry over different issues. The student community was upset over the new reservation policy (which the present government had inherited) as that had reduced the general category reservation in higher educational institutions. People were also upset over the issues of the introduction of electricity metres and the non-restoration of Statehood.

When members of the CCG asked whether installing electricity metres was not a good measure, a senior Kashmiri retorted, “Sure but at least give us electricity. We are paying high electricity bills without uninterrupted electricity supply. These meters were supposed to prevent interruptions. Why are we paying such high bills when we produce hydro power here and yet have long hours of power cuts.”

This anger against the Abdullah government at times, stated the CCG report, seemed misplaced. In the last six months the local government has faced the war that caused casualties in the border areas and destruction of nearly 850 houses in Poonch district alone. Then there were unprecedented natural calamities. The Chief Minister was seen in the media visiting every disaster hit area within hours, inspecting the damage caused, giving instructions to the local civil authorities for steps to be taken to rescue victims to safer places, and providing shelter and compensation and meeting victims.

This year’s natural calamity, a result of climate change and possibly a recurring feature in the near future, is much discussed in both the regions of the UT. The road widening projects, reckless cutting down of trees and blasting of mountainsides was blamed for the landslides, mudslides and roads being washed away in Jammu region. There are, however, no signs yet of this emerging public concern converting itself into sustained civil society movement pushing for government action for mitigation of climate change impact.

Crucially, there is a pervading fear of voicing any dissenting views or opinions by civil society members. Repression by the police on this front is real that does not spare public intellectuals, media persons and others.

Meanwhile, anti-India sentiment is spreading widely. Public sentiment that had largely turned away from Pakistan has shifted since Operation Sindoor, we were told. While militancy remains at a slow burn, a churning among youth seems to be motivating them to enter spaces of greater radicalisation, possibly supported by forces across the Line of Control.

“We have been silenced”, said a prominent doctor of Srinagar speaking to members of the CCG, “But the eerie silence does not mean all is hunky-dory.” The volcano of suppressed anger and frustration bordering on hatred could erupt any time, he felt as “all it needs is a trigger.”

A retired professor claimed that there was “no protection for Kashmiri identity today” and on top that there was a sense of economic disempowerment. Another prominent civil society member claimed, “We Kashmiris are rebuked and abused at every occasion. The national media plays dirty and projects all Kashmiris as villains.” He also objected to the concert of Bollywood singer Sonu Nigam, which was only attended “by security personnel and their families” as ordinary Kashmiris boycotted it. “He reportedly has problems with the call for prayer, Azaan. He was sponsored by a corporate TV channel close to the government and people saw it as cultural invasion. We have our own cultural traditions. We don’t need people like him.”

The dominant civil society view –states the CCG report–was that India was moving towards majoritarian rule under the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). “We oppose the BJP because of what it is doing to the Constitution of India. We are dedicated to the Constitution because it gives us our rights as citizens of India. Our loyalty is to the Constitution and not to any political party,” a prominent civil society leader said.

Another public intellectual, a prominent academic, recalled that “Sheikh Abdullah agreed to join Nehru’s India but wondered quite often what might happen if Hindu majoritarianism came to power in India” suggesting that that scenario had come true. This was not the India, Sheikh Abdullah and the Kashmiris had joined, “As a Muslim in India today I am denigrated by those with a Hindu majoritarian mindset,” he claimed.

He went on to say, “nobody here talks of India’s need to engage with Pakistan. That is for the Indian state to figure out. Nor are we in a position to say what kind of dialogue should be held with those Kashmiris who are in jail. But we had an identity as Kashmiris. That was a protection against Pakistan’s designs on Kashmir. And now even that has been taken away.”

People were apprehensive about the constant anti-Pakistan statements by the senior ministers of the Modi Government and repeated visits of senior Army officers to the border areas.

Others told us that the lack of jobs, uncertainty about the future, general societal anger and alienation were producing two types of negative reactions in some of the youth: they are either turning to drugs or, increasingly, towards radicalisation. Both these trends worry the Kashmiris who feel that they are destructive for the Kashmiri society. However, they also feel helpless over how to address these negative trends.

A senior editor said, “This silence of the Kashmiri society is unsustainable. It has to explode and we cannot say anything about its timing. But when it does, it would be dangerous.”

A political leader sensing the mood at Ground Zero warned the CCG team, “Kuch bada hone wala hai (something ‘big’ is going to happen)”. One had heard the same apprehension in August. Was it a foreboding of the horrific terrorist attack of November 10 that took place after our Group returned and smothered 11 innocent lives? One does not know.

1. Overall political situation

From the CCG Report: A year after the National Conference led alliance won AN overwhelming majority in the 2024 Assembly elections and Omar Abdullah Government was sworn in, the government is struggling. The public is unhappy that the promises made to the electorate are not being fulfilled fast enough.

However, Omar Abdullah also presides over a powerless government. He is not able to take any major decisions, as most of the decision-making powers are with the Lieutenant Governor, including appointments of civil servants and police officers. All this is only adding to the people’s frustrations. People are resentful that hardly any Kashmiri Officers are posted as administrative heads at the districts and are effectively sidelined. The officers from outside the UT, they claim, neither understand the language nor the local situation, resulting in a gap in public connect.

The internal strain within the National Conference and disagreement between the Chief Minister and the party’s very popular Lok Sabha member from Budgam are played out publicly. This is having its negative fallout as both sides have hardened their respective stands over issues which has now turned into personal battle. As a result of this, there was public perception that National Conference would lose the by-election in Budgam constituency, which was vacated by Omar Abdullah. (The NC lost the election and PDP won it, giving the latter much needed boost).

There is speculation in a section of the public that the National Conference’s Budgam MP is being instigated to weaken the National Conference and eventually destabilize Omar Abdullah government. However, there seems TO BE no evidence to support such a claim.

The Rajya Sabha elections for the four J&K seats that took place just before CCG’s visit, showed how skilfully the BJP managed to get the four extra votes, above its number of MLAs, in the Legislative Assembly. These elections have also widened the fissures between the governing alliance partners – the National Conference and the Congress. Each side holds the other responsible for this.

Former CM, Mehbooba Mufti is slowly growing in strength politically. She is raising issues that are of people’s concerns, holding demonstrations on different issues that are agitating the public. Recently she had filed a PIL in J&K High Court regarding those held for several years without trial in jails in different parts of the country, demanding that they be shifted to local jails as most families were unable to visit them due to lack of financial resources. She was herself present in the court for the hearing. This has struck a positive chord with the public as this has been a major issue of concern among the Kashmiris since 2019.

This issue of young people in prisons as well AS political leaders who are imprisoned since 2019, was also raised by Mirwaiz Umar Farooq during his meeting with our group. He told us that many parents come to him pleading that something be done to have their sons released from jails.

The Mirwaiz also told us about the kind of intimidation and surveillance he faces. Sometimes the senior cleric is allowed to give Friday sermons and then suddenly prevented from going to Jama Masjid for weeks without any reason. He is asked to show written text of his Friday sermons the night before for scrutiny. He is also asked to show his appointments for conducting marriages and even the Nikah Namas to the police.

The government, however, did allow him to go to Delhi to depose before the Joint Parliamentary Committee on the Waqf Bill. During the visit he met people in Delhi and had hoped that some political process would be initiated. He is a strong advocate of dialogue between Delhi and Srinagar and also feels that the tensions between India-Pakistan can be addressed through dialogue as lack of diplomatic relations was having a negative impact on the ground. He told us he was willing to play his part in this process, as he had done earlier.

One of the promises that were fulfilled by the Abdullah government was the Darbar Move for six months to Jammu. On November 1, government offices shifted to Jammu. This was in response to the demands of the Jammu public to bring the government closer to them, as well as bring the Kashmiris and Jammuites closer and allow greater economic interaction between the small traders and businessmen of the two regions. However, this alone was unlikely to overcome the sentiments of the Hindus of Jammu. Since the Assembly elections polarization has increased in Jammu plains against Muslims of Kashmir Valley. There are isolated incidents of social boycott of Muslims in the outskirts of Jammu city and in rural pockets. For the first time Jammu city saw war come close to them during Op Sindoor. Many Hindus migrated from Jammu city during the short war to neighbouring Himachal or Delhi. Some have even bought properties there. One public intellectual said, “We in Jammu also feel like an occupied colony. We are nowhere in the scheme of things. Only Kashmir is talked about”. Anger and alienation against New Delhi seem to be building up AMONGST Jammu’s Hindus too.

2. Statehood denial and its implications

From the CCG Report: Resentment on the non- restoration of statehood continues to be massive and overwhelming. Our Group witnessed at first hand the anger, frustration and disillusionment on this issue during our interactions with members of civil society, trade and industry representatives, businessmen, educationists, media-persons and Kashmiri Pandit leaders among others. While statehood is a significant and serious issue in the Valley, our Group learned that the Jammu region also continues to nurse anger over the loss of statehood and many related issues impacting them post-2019.

A senior political leader indicated the “root-cause” of the statehood denial to J&K saying, “Elections happened but the results were not to the expectations of the BJP government at the Centre. They could not get a BJP-led or a BJP-dependent government in Srinagar. It has been a year since the popular protest mandate given to Omar Abdullah. But the Centre has not been able to digest it.”

At the CCG meeting with Farooq Abdullah, President of the ruling National Conference (NC), Chief Minister (CM) Omar Abdullah, Deputy CM Surinder Choudhary, Lok Sabha MP Gurvinder Singh ‘Shammi’ Oberoi and Political Advisor to CM Nasir Wani were present among others. The double whammy of denial of statehood and existential diarchy and its consequential impact came out in bold relief during the discussions.

Terming himself as “half a CM”, despite having an overwhelming public mandate (41 out of 47 seats in the Valley and absolute majority in the J&K UT Assembly), Omar Abdullah lamented that in the prevalent diarchy–a sharp democratic regress–the Lt Governor exercises meaningful and effective power while he and his elected government are helpless in meeting peoples’ needs, address their grievances and strive to fulfil their aspirations. The existential structure of governance, it is useful to recall, resembles the colonial-type diarchy of 1919-1920 under which the British denied political power to elected governments of states in India by implementing strict repressive measures.

A young professional speaking to the CCG, averred: Kashmir is a colony of the Viceroy; the elected government is seen as completely toothless. It is the civil bureaucracy that exercises vast untrammelled power on behalf of the LG. In such a scenario people gravitate towards civil servants for their needs and grievances in effect bypassing the Cabinet Ministers they elected.

In its first sitting in October 2024, the newly elected Assembly had passed a resolution for speedy restoration of statehood. But even after over a year there has been no progress. A degree of political engagement by the Centre of people across multi-dimensional vectors would have calmed matters somewhat. The need for restoration of statehood on an urgent basis was also conveyed to us during our meetings with Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, Hurriyat leader and Kashmir Valley’s Chief Cleric, Tariq Hameed Karra, President J&K Congress and its Secretary General GA Mir and Chief Whip Nizamuddin Bhat, NC’s Lok Sabha MP Syed Ruhullah, CPI (M) leader MY Tarigami and others. It hardly merits emphasis that non-restoration of statehood means the Human Rights Commission, Consumer Commission and appellate authorities—that routinely operate in a state—cannot function in a UT, leading to denial of redressal mechanisms to people in J&K who are already indignant and feel disempowered and alienated.

During the several conversations that visiting members of the CCG had with cross sections of society, A deep sense of loss felt by people of Kashmir—of identity, sub-identity, dignity and honour—found repeated mention. Exasperation and estrangement emanating from the humiliating nullification of Article 370, Article 35A and bifurcation of J&K into two UTs still persist. These hurt sentiments, sections of political leadership and civil society told our group, have compounded distrust towards the Centre with the non-restoration of statehood fanning the bitterness and feeling of political neglect even more. Omar Abdullah was forthright and categorical: no political entity, not least leaders of non-BJP parties in the rest of India have any sympathy and concern for the people of J&K. As to the ruling dispensation—aside from not fulfilling the promise of restoration of statehood made repeatedly by the Prime Minister and the Home Minister over the last seven years—when did it last convene an All-Party meeting on the situation in J&K?

During discussions, a view was expressed that the J&K Reorganisation Act (2019) provided the BJP ideology an opportunity to leverage the UT status of J&K not only to impose repressive policies but also initiate attempts to cobble together a BJP-led government. In such a situation, restoration of statehood would have found greater traction at the Centre. But with the Assembly elections putting paid to such a prospect, chances of early restoration are remote. A leading politician also ascribed the delay to the huge disconnect between Kashmir and its understanding in the rest of India.

It would be useful to recall that in the Supreme Court’s verdict on Article 370 petitions, the Bench said it would not adjudicate on the issue (of demoting and bifurcating an existing state into two UTs) because the Solicitor General had assured it that statehood would be restored. Significantly, in a separate note attached to the SC’s 370 judgement, Justice Sanjiv Khanna (who later became the Chief Justice of India) had stated that the demotion of a state to two UTs was “unconstitutional and should be summarily reversed.” It is this assertion that has sought to reinforce the views of the many we met that the reversal must happen without further delay.

When some petitioners that included Air Vice Marshal Kapil Kak (retd) a member of our Group moved the Supreme Court again for fulfilment of the promise of restoration of statehood to J&K, the Court made oral observations that what happened in Pahalgam (April 22, 2025 terror attack) cannot be ignored. The alleged Red Fort terrorist attack of November10 (after our Group returned from Kashmir) may serve to further dissuade the Supreme Court. But it must render justice on the issue strictly on legal merits and not allow Pahalgam and now Red Fort terror attacks overshadow the urgent need for restoration of statehood to Jammu and Kashmir.

3. Reservations time-bomb

From the CCG Report: The youngsters of Kashmir are upset with the reservations policy in the UT and they are demanding ‘rationalisation’ of the policy – reservation according to a community’s share in the population. What seems to have upset them most is that the additional 10% reservation given to the Pahari community by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government at the Centre which cuts into the share of the general category.

Overall reservations in J&K have, therefore, gone up to nearly 60%, the highest in the country when the broad Constitutional limit is 50%.

The formal reservation structure in J&K is as follows: Open Merit 50%; Scheduled castes 8%; Scheduled Tribes 20% (used to be 10% but Paharis have been given 10% ST reservation as well); Socially and economically backward classes 22% (residents of backward areas 10%; residents of areas adjoining Line of Actual Control/international border 4%, other OBCs 8%); horizontal reservations 6% (Children of defence personnel 3%, children of paramilitary and police personnel 1%, candidates possessing outstanding proficiency in sports 2% 0; and economically weaker sections (EWS) 10%.

However, since the horizontal reservations (defence, police, paramilitary and sports quota) and the EWS quota are from the Open Merit category, the effective reservation in that Open Merit category goes down.

The J&K Students’ Association which has been spearheading the demand that reservations be rationalised argues, “Reservations should be based on population ratios. According to the 2011 census, 69% of the Jammu and Kashmir population falls under the general category, yet the opportunities for open merit have been shrinking.” Therefore nearly 70% of the population competes for less than 40% of the job opportunities because of the expanded reservation quotas.

The immediate provocation for the students’ demand for rationalisation of reservations is the 10% ST reservation given to the Pahari speaking people of Jammu. While they clarify that they have got nothing against the Pahari community, they are against ST status being given for the first time in India on linguistic basis to Pahari speakers. “It was an appeasement measure. The BJP hoped that the Pahari community would vote for it if it were given ST reservation but that did not happen in the assembly election,” a student leader said.

The student leaders said that the ST reservation was given to the Pahari community by an Act of Parliament. “However, we are making a demand on the state government to rationalise the reservation issues which are in their domain. For example, looking at the definition of creamy layer, regional distribution of reservations, making EWS reservations J&K specific, and re-examining whether Reservation for Backward Areas makes any sense or needs to be scrapped when all the areas of J&K are well connected through road and other infrastructure.”

CCG Report:

The students feel that an overwhelming majority of the reservations have gone to Jammu and “Kashmir is proportionately discriminated against.”  According to figures provided by the state’s minister for revenue in the UT assembly on October 27, in the last two years, of the reservation certificates issued Jammu residents received 99% of the SC, 87% of the ST, 57% of OBC, 88% of EWS, 32% of Resident of Backward Area (RBA), 85% of resident of Actual Line of Control and 100% of “other” category certificates.

Except in the case of RBA category, Jammu seems to have been the overwhelming beneficiary of reservation certificates issued in the last two years, underlining the deep regional imbalance that is emerging. This data is bound to reignite the debate on the new reservation policy and further fuel the anger of the students. The issue is already being agitated in the J&K High Court and the students have as yet put forward their demands peacefully without taking to the streets.

The J&K government did set up a three-member House Committee to look into the reservations issue and its report, accepted by the government, is now laying with the Lt. Governor’s office. The students are not happy with the Committee which apparently did not organise stakeholder consultations before finalising its report and has only members from the ST community. “So, how can we expect any justice from it?” asked a student leader. However, the details of the report are not as yet in the public domain and therefore its recommendations are purely in the domain of speculation as of now.

The students, meanwhile, demand that, among other things, the government rationalise EWS eligibility to reflect ground realities and make it less urban-centric, re-classify backward area designation, periodic review of the reservations policy every five years, eliminate ‘politically motivated’ and arbitrary inclusion in reservation lists, create a unified Backward Classes Commission for J&K, and protect the rights of the Open Merit (general) category.

However, Kashmiri students are not the only ones agitated about the reservations issue.

The 1947-48 Hindu refugees of Poonch districts now settled in Jammu are not included in the Pahari reservation although they are Pahari and Pahari-speaking. This group has a grievance that they have been arbitrarily excluded. Similarly, the Pahari-speakers of Ramban district have been excluded while reservation applies to the adjoining Poonch and Rajouri districts.

N.B.: The Gujjars who were angry and protested when Pahari reservation was announced have now calmed down as their 10% reservation is intact and not affected by the new reserved category. However, there is anger among them as the Indian Administrative Service and Kashmir Administrative Service Gujjar officers have allegedly been sidelined completely and are not in positions of decision making, not dissimilar to many Kashmiri officers. A Gujjar public intellectual said that one would not find any Gujjar even as SHO in the 10 districts of Jammu division. According to him, this is not just creating disquiet but also building up anger in the community. Gujjars point out that as Indian nationalists they have played a significant role in defending border areas. But are now sidelined. They feel alienated and this will have an impact on the security situation.

4. Media continues to be under threat

From the CCG Report: Contrary to expectations, despite the UT assembly elections of 2024, there has been no meaningful restoration of media autonomy. Ongoing censorship, surveillance and intimidation of media practitioners continues, restricting media freedom severely.

Although internet shutdown is now infrequent, harassment of journalists, revocation of press credentials and pressure to publish administration friendly narratives continue. Operation Sindoor placed severe restrictions on media reportage and most Kashmiri journalists were not able to report about the developments on the ground. Some were summoned by the police about their attempts to report. Reports that had been filed were pulled down under pressure because it went against the government’s narrative. Things, however, seem to have eased a bit in the last three months, journalists claim.

The head of Directorate of Information and Public Relations (DIPR) has been given additional charge in the Raj Bhavan (Lt. Governor’s residence) and he sits there. This, journalists claim, shifts the media control to the Lt. Governor’s office, which already has a media adviser, who has gained notoriety for capricious decisions about giving out government ads to selected news platforms and denying it to others. Media accreditation has been denied to prominent national publications like the Times of India, Economic Times, NDTV and The Hindu. The media accreditation of the Economic Times was inexplicably revoked.

Journalists are denied press passes even for covering the legislative assembly proceedings on the whims of the powers that be. Journalists in Kashmir complain that by not allowing them to cover public events organised by the government is akin to deliberately sabotaging their careers.

Meanwhile, the J&K administration has introduced a new verification process to identify “real” journalists by asking for submission of salary slips as well as detailed background information from those who want to be included in the list of “bona fide” media professionals.

In a directive issued on October 31, the District Information Officers have been instructed to collect the background information of the media personnel operating in their jurisdiction, request them to submit salary slips for the last six months and maintain a regularly updated “verified list” of accredited and bona fide media persons.

The justification for such a directive is the “repeated complaints” received about the misuse of media credentials, curbing impersonation, blackmail and extortion and circulation of defamatory content. Officials argue that the move was necessitated by the rise of social media platforms and locally trusted digital outlets. These, they claim have, blurred the lines between professionals and self-styled journalists.

Journalists have opposed the move calling it intrusive and a potential crackdown on press freedom.

The Lt. Governor, the journalists claim, keeps talking of tackling the over ground workers (OGWs) and the terrorist eco-system and apprehend that any one of them can be designated as part of that ecosystem and prosecuted. A journalist Irfan Mehraj has been in Rohini Jail in Delhi for over 1,00 days now they point out and each time he applies for bail, he finds the judge has changed and the hearing has to begin afresh.

5. Trade and business after Pahalgam

Tourism:

Post-Pahalgam terror, Kashmir was emptied of tourists overnight. The tragedy struck at the beginning of the promising tourist season in which thousands of Kashmiris are involved – Hoteliers and their staff members, taxi operators, houseboat owners, shopkeepers and scores of other businesses. The tourism industry was hit badly. As weeks stretched into months without any tourist traffic, thousands who depended on their livelihoods on tourism were left without work and prospects of no earnings, so necessary for the harsh winter months when tourist traffic is reduced.

During our visit several hoteliers also told us that many had to lay off some of their staff. During the Diwali vacation there was some tourist traffic which increased to about 30% but we also heard another hotelier saying the increase in tourist traffic was hardly 10-15%. Perhaps different categories of hotels were hit differently. However, the total loss to tourism industry is hard to estimate as no one has calculated the loss of revenue so far.

One of the other issues bothering the hoteliers of Kashmir (and also of Jammu), is the Union Territory’s new Land Policy. Most leases are expiring or have expired. But instead of renewing these, as happens in rest of India, the UT government as per the New Act decided to auction the land on which the hotels have been built.

Gulmarg has been a special focus for implementation of the policy. Although the land leases of hotels in Srinagar and Jammu too have expired, these are not the focus of government action. The current owners who have invested substantial amounts in constructing and running these hotels, are not given any preference in the auctions conducted. The hoteliers have been demanding that the same rules be applied to expired land leases in Delhi which is also a Union Territory, as well as the other states in the rest of India.

Horticulture:

From the CCG Report: This sector generates major revenue for Kashmir and Kashmiris. Almost every family in South Kashmir has a small or big orchard and earn something out of it. This sector of THE economy too suffered badly in 2025.

Just as the apples were being harvested, there were heavy rains in the Jammu region. This caused landslides with some stretches of Srinagar-Jammu Highway being washed away. For about 20-22 days, around 4,000 trucks laden with fruits were stranded on the highway. This transportation delay completely damaged the fruit. During that period the harvested apples remained in the orchards and could not be shipped out. Although Kashmir has now cold storage facilities for apples, it is not adequate to store all the harvested apples. Some of the fruit was also damaged when heavy rains came to Kashmir.

According to the President of the Pulwama Fruit Mandi, the orchardists have suffered losses of over Rs. 2000 crore this year. At the Pulwama fruit Mandi, every day during the harvest season, 50 trucks with an average capacity of 25-30 tons of fruits, are loaded. Each truck is worth around Rs 7 lakhs – amounting to a daily profit of Rs 3.5 crore. This activity goes on for about two and half months.

The Central Government and the J&K government did respond to the crisis by sending goods trains from Srinagar to ferry Apples to the Indian markets in Delhi and elsewhere to address the crisis but not before substantial losses had already incurred. Some smaller trucks also took the fruit via the Mughal Road to the Jammu Mandi. The Fruit growers want crop insurance for fruits as well. They also feel that the J&K Government does not give as much support as the Himachal government gives to the fruit growers there.

The launching of goods trains directly from Delhi and Punjab has, however, upset the Jammu traders and transporters, who transported goods including fruit, to the Jammu and Delhi markets. They fear that Jammu would suffer further economic loss because of this, as the entire transport sector – truck owners, loaders and others in Jammu Mandi would see job and income losses. A member of the Jammu Chamber of Commerce commented, “The government is not consulting traders here before implementing important decisions that will affect trade here.” He was very bitter about this.

Disclaimer: The CCG does not claim to do present a situation perfectly as it is virtually impossible to meet the representatives of all groups, communities, ethnicities and interests. Often the administration itself makes it impossible for the group to meet people, such as advising them not to meet us as happened this time when the CCG members wanted to visit Shopian to meet the apple traders in the local mandi (wholesale market). Earlier, the group members have been confined to their hotel premises by the police, locked up at the Srinagar airport lounge and one of its members even deported to Delhi. While with the advent of a democratically elected government the group expected that its movement would not be restricted, this time around the people we were supposed to meet were told not to meet the group.

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are the author’s personal views, and do not necessarily represent the views of Sabrangindia.

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Syncretic Dreams, Shattered Realities: Kashmir in “The Hybrid Wanderers”

The post Pervasive fear, surveillance of media, spiral of anti-India sentiment in Kashmir: CCG appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Yet, the film’s real significance lies not in its artistic value but in its ideological purpose. It continues a project begun decades ago by P. N. Oak, a Maharashtrian Brahmin ideologue whose writings fused conspiracy, caste supremacy, and cultural chauvinism into a potent mythos. Oak’s “Tejo Mahalay” theory, though dismissed by every serious historian and by the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI), continues to shape popular nationalist imagination. Yet beneath the spectacle of “historical reclamation” lies a more insidious purpose—Oak’s narratives serve to consolidate Brahminical supremacy under the garb of cultural nationalism, while simultaneously erasing Rajput agency and demonising Muslims.

The Ideological Lineage: From Savarkar to Oak 

P. N. Oak (1917–2007) came from the same ideological and cultural milieu as V. D. Savarkar, M. S. Golwalkar, and K. B. Hedgewar—all Maharashtrian Brahmins who sought to define India as a Hindu Rashtra under Brahminical hegemony. Their nostalgia for the Peshwa era of the Maratha polity reflected a longing for a Brahmin-led theocratic order—one that combined scriptural orthodoxy with militant nationalism. In their eyes, the Peshwas represented a purified Hindu past: Sanskritic, hierarchical, and morally austere, unlike the syncretic world of the Rajputs and the cosmopolitanism of the Mughals.

For Oak, as for these ideologues, the Mughal empire epitomised “foreign domination,” while Rajput kingship—though Hindu—was morally suspect because of its historical engagement with the Mughals through diplomacy and marriage. The Rajputs’ cultural openness and martial honour did not fit into the Hindutva binary of invader versus resister. Thus, Oak’s project was twofold: to vilify Muslim rulers and to discipline Rajput history—absorbing it into a Brahmin-sanctioned Hindu narrative where Rajputs were useful only as foils or symbols.

“Tejo Mahalay”: The Appropriation of the Rajput Legacy

Oak’s most famous work, republished as The Taj Mahal: The True Story (1989) — claimed that Shah Jahan merely took over a pre-existing Rajput palace or temple, allegedly dedicated to Shiva and known as “Tejo Mahalay.” He even speculated that it had been built by the Chandelas of Bundelkhand or the Kachhwahas of Amber—two illustrious Rajput lineages. This claim was entirely devoid of evidence, but it was ideologically potent. It allowed Oak and later Hindutva propagandists to erase Muslim creativity while simultaneously appropriating Rajput heritage into the Brahminical fold.

In this retelling, Rajputs cease to be historical agents; they become tokens in a morality play staged by Brahminical nationalism. Their temples, forts, and palaces are recast as manifestations of an imagined “Vedic civilisation” over which Brahmins alone hold interpretive authority. Once their history has served its purpose—negating the Muslim contribution—it is re-absorbed into the greater “Hindu” past defined by Sanskritic ideology. Thus, Tejo Mahalay functions as a symbolic colonisation of Rajput legacy: the Rajput is stripped of agency, and the Brahmin is enthroned as interpreter and custodian of history.

“Mina Bazar”: Objectifying Rajput Women to vilify Mughals

Another recurring motif in Oak’s writings—and in later Hindutva propaganda—is the Mina Bazar, a courtly fair allegedly held during Mughal times where noblewomen and men interacted. Oak and his ideological successors portrayed this event as a site of immorality and licentiousness, an emblem of Mughal decadence. But within these retellings, Rajput noblewomen— who actively participated in courtly diplomacy—became the primary objects of moral commentary. They were presented as helpless “Hindu daughters” exploited by Muslim kings, their identities erased and their agency denied.

Yet, historical, and literary records reveal an entirely different picture. Rajput and Mughal cultures carried similar notions towards honour of women — including each other’s. One such episode, recounted in both Rajasthani oral traditions and Mughal chronicles, involves Raja Aniruddh Singh Hada of Bundi and Jahanara Begum, the daughter of Shah Jahan.

When Jahanara Begum once found her camp attacked by Marathas, she called Rao Aniruddh Singh Hada close to her elephant and told him:

“Asmat-e-Chaghtaiya wa Rajput yak ast”: The honour of a Chaghtai (Mughal) woman and that of a Rajput are one and the same.

She added, “If God gives us victory with this small army that would be good; otherwise rest assured about me, I shall sit down after doing my work.” Moved by this declaration of shared honour, Raja Hada and his Rajput soldiers fought valiantly and emerged victorious.

This exchange—whether apocryphal or literal—speaks to the deep respect and chivalric regard that often-defined Rajput-Mughal interactions, far removed from the predatory caricatures peddled by Hindutva storytellers. Oak and his successors rewrite a history of mutual cultural respect into one of sexual conquest.

In short, the Mina Bazar myth is anti-Rajput woman, a patriarchal narrative disguised as historical morality.

The Brahminical Core of Hindutva Historiography

Oak’s work exposes the Brahminical DNA of Hindutva historiography. His narratives consistently elevate the Brahmin as the intellectual and moral authority over India’s past, while marginalising both the Rajput’s martial honour and the Muslim’s cultural brilliance.

By glorifying the Peshwas and appropriating Rajput heritage, Oak reaffirmed a social hierarchy in which Brahmins claim ownership of sacred knowledge and interpretation, while warriors, artisans, and others exist merely as instruments. This is why the “Tejo Mahalay” theory cannot be dismissed as mere eccentricity—it represents a Brahminical takeover of historical memory, a deliberate attempt to collapse India’s plural past into a single, Sanskritic mythos.

In doing so, Oak’s revisionism advances two parallel exclusions:

1. It excludes Muslims from the civilisational narrative by branding their contributions “foreign.”
2. It subordinates Rajputs by converting their legacy into property of the Brahmin-defined “Hindu civilisation.”

The result is an ideological order where only the Brahmin remains autonomous; everyone else, living or historical, exists within his interpretive domain.

From Fringe Pseudo-history to State-sanctioned Narrative

For decades, Oak’s theories were dismissed as fringe conspiracy. Yet today, his ideas echo through court petitions, WhatsApp forwards, and government-linked cultural projects. His books are republished, his claims amplified by television debates and political speeches. The release of The Taj Story marks the cultural mainstreaming of this pseudohistory. By presenting Oak’s fiction through the medium of film, the Hindutva ecosystem gives it emotional force and legitimacy. The courtroom format of the movie—where the Taj Mahal is “put on trial”—turns propaganda into performance, inviting audiences to see pseudohistory as suppressed truth.

This is not about rediscovering history—it is about owning it. By turning monuments into religious battlegrounds, Hindutva ideologues redirect social frustration away from real inequities—caste injustice, unemployment, agrarian distress—and towards imagined enemies. The Rajput, whose history of honour and sovereignty once stood apart, is now re-cast as the obedient foot-soldier of this Brahminical nationalism.

Rajputs in the Crossfire of Myth and Politics

The irony is profound. The same ideological movement that glorifies “Hindu warriors” has historically shown disdain for Rajput political traditions. Savarkar and Golwalkar’s writings betray a deep discomfort with Rajput alliances with Mughals, and an implicit preference for Brahmin-led militarism like that of the Peshwas.

Oak’s narratives continue this trend: Rajputs are celebrated only as mythic ancestors, never as living agents. Their plural political ethos—the synthesis of valour, diplomacy, and cultural patronage—is erased. Their women become allegories of victimhood; their men, backdrops for Brahminical triumphalism.

This trend is exemplified by a recently viral X post  by Brahmin influencer Amit Schandillia, who appropriates the pre-16th century Jauhars of Rajput women to vilify the Muslim community. He deliberately frames these pre-16th century tragedies as ‘Hindu’ events and uses them to erase the long, convivial, and harmonious history shared between Rajputs and Muslims up to 1947.

In this way, the Hindutva appropriation of Rajput history mirrors its treatment of India itself: a civilisation reimagined as a homogenous Brahminical state, scrubbed of diversity and stripped of nuance.

Conclusion

P. N. Oak’s legacy is not one of historical revision but of ideological engineering. His “Tejo Mahalay” myth and “Mina Bazar” fantasy are not just anti-Muslim—they are anti-Rajput and fundamentally Brahminical. They recast the Rajput past into a mere accessory for Brahminical nationalism, while exploiting Rajput women’s image to moralise history through patriarchal codes.

Behind the spectacle of “Hindu pride” lies a deeper agenda: the re-assertion of Brahmin control over India’s collective memory. What appears as the reclamation of the Taj Mahal is, in truth, the conquest of the past by caste. Oak’s project—and the films and movements that follow from it—transform history from a field of inquiry into a battlefield of hierarchy.

To defend the integrity of India’s past, one must see through these saffron myths and recognise their caste logic. The struggle is not just over monuments but over meaning—between those who seek to understand history in its fullness, and those who wish to reduce it to the propaganda of a Brahminical state.

(The author is a mechanical engineer and an independent commentator on history and politics, with a particular focus on Rajasthan. His work explores the syncretic exchanges of India’s borderlands as well as contemporary debates on memory, identity and historiography)

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The post The Taj Story & Resurgence of a Myth, the ideological engineering of a Brahmanical narrative of pseudo-history appeared first on SabrangIndia.

Friends in India and abroad wished to have a compilation of documentary evidence of how both the Indian State and Supreme Court succumbed to a majoritarian project of obliterating a historic mosque at Ayodhya on December 6, 1992. The following description and timeline examines the Hindutva propaganda falsehood with irrefutable facts which were conspicuously overlooked by the most crucial institutions of the Indian state.

Falsehood 1: Babri mosque built after destroying Ram birthplace temple

The supremacist Hindutva lot claimed that the new Ram temple was built on an ancient site of Hindu worship; the Ram birthplace temple which was destroyed in the early 16th century (1528-29) during the reign of the first Mughal emperor, Babar by one of his commanders, Mir Baqi. Archaeological evidence proves the mosque had no foundations of its own and was built upon a Hindu temple. They even identified the exact place of birth of Ram; under the central dome (approximately measuring 150 cm x 150 cm) of the Babri Mosque.

This falsehood has been repeated by none less than Narendra Modi several times since 2014 when he took over as Prime Minister of India, the latest pccasion being at Ayodhya on November 25, 2025, when he stated: “The wounds of centuries are healing, the pain of centuries is finding an end today, the resolution of centuries is achieving success today. Today marks the final offering of a yajna whose fire burned for 500 years.”[1]

Truth 1: This is a brazen falsehood propagated by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) with no historical or legal proof, nor any corroboration even in the ‘Hindu’ narratives of history. There is no mention of the destruction of Ram Temple even in the writings of the most prominent Ram worshiper to date, Goswami Tulsidas (1511-1623), who penned the Epic Ramcharitmanas (Lake of the Deeds of Ram) in the Avadhi language in 1575-76. It was this work which made Ram the most popular God in Northern India. According to the Hindutva version, Ram’s birthplace temple was destroyed in the period 1528-1529. It would be surprising indeed if the Ramcharitmanas, written almost 48 years after the so-called destruction of Ram’s birthplace temple, did not mention such a momentous event. Does the Hindutva lot mean to argue that the revered Saint, Goswami Tulsidas was a coward?!

For the RSS, Aurobindo Ghosh, Swami Vivekananda, and Swami Dayanand Saraswati were the saints who contributed immensely to the cause of Vedic religion and the growth of the Hindu nation. None of these Vedic saints ever referred to this destruction of Ram Temple at Ayodhya by Mughal King Babar or his agents in any of their writings.

Today, Ayodhya is referred to as one of the oldest and holiest places for Hindus. It is interesting to note that Adi Shankaracharya (788-820), who toured India preaching Vedas and refuting Buddhism and Jainism for more than a decade, who established 5 Peetams [main centres of Sanatan Hinduism] at Badrinath in the North, Puri in the East, Dwarka in the West and Sringeri and Kanchi in the South for the revival of the Vedic religion but did not consider Ayodhya as one.

It is true that traditionally, Hindus believe that Ram was born in the city of Ayodhya, but the issue is whether he was born exactly under the central dome (approximately measuring 150 cm x 150 cm) of the Babri Mosque as is claimed now by Hindutva’s flag-bearers.

Moreover, the Indian Supreme Court, in its 1,045-page Ayodhya Judgment (November 9, 2019), has, nowhere in the Judgment agreed with the claim that the Babri Mosque was constructed after destroying any temple.

Indian Supreme Court, in the said judgment made two other observations demolishing the RSS claim on the Mosque. Firstly, the SC stated: “The exclusion of the Muslims from worship and possession took place on the intervening night between 22/23 December 1949 when the mosque was desecrated by the installation of Hindu idols. The ouster of the Muslims on that occasion was not through any lawful authority but through an act which was calculated to deprive them of their place of worship.” [Supreme Court Judgment dated November 9, 2019, pp. 921-22]

Secondly, at pages 913-14, the SC stated that “On 6 December 1992, the structure of the mosque was brought down and the mosque was destroyed. The destruction of the mosque took place in breach of the order of status quo and an assurance given to this Court. The destruction of the mosque and the obliteration of the Islamic structure was an egregious violation of the rule of law.”

However, Mother India ought to be aghast to find Indian Supreme Court, despite all the above findings in its own verdict handed over a historic building which was a protected monument under Article 49 of Indian Constitution to supremacists. Arguably, what a supremacist mob could not achieve on December 6, 1992, the Supreme Court of India handed them on November 9, 2019.

It is worth mentioning here that the RSS—which initiated the bloody, violent campaign to build the Ram Temple at the end of the decade of the 1980s, never advanced this demand during the period of its founding (1925) until India attained Independence. Even after Independence, it was only in 1989 that the political appendage of the RSS, the BJP, began to focus on this issue.

The views of two RSS luminaries who initiated the Ram Temple movement reveal the preposterousness of the claim that Ram himself was born under the dome.

Rama Vilas Vedanti, a prominent Hindu clergyman of the Ram Birthplace Trust (an RSS front), stated, “We will build a temple at Ramjanam Bhoomi even if Lord Rama says he was not born there” [Outlook, Delhi, 7 July 2003). Similarly, L. K. Advani, who rode a chariot (Rath Yatra) as part of an aggressive Ram Temple campaign in 1990 said, “It did not matter whether the historical Rama was actually born at the spot in Ayodhya. What mattered was that Hindus believed that he was born there. Faith took precedence over history” [The Hindustan Times, Delhi, 20 July 2003.]

Falsehood 2: Ram Temple at the site of the Babri Mosque was essential to seek ‘restorative justice’

According to RSS the Ram Mandir has great symbolic and emotional resonance for Hindus in contemporary times and that the trauma that this destruction brought has been passed down through generations and continues to impact the psyche of Hindus and contributed historically and continues to contribute to Hindu-Muslim tensions in India to this day.

Truth 2: According to this logic, the rule by rulers with Muslim names in India was the Islamic rule of idol-breakers. This narrative of Muslim history developed only at the beginning of the 19^th century is in absolute contradiction with historical facts and even common sense. To understand the lies behind this fabricated Medieval past, one needs to examine the nature of this ‘Muslim’ rule.

Despite ‘Muslim’ rule of almost one thousand years, approximately 75% of Indians did not convert to Islam, as was made clear by the first Census held by the British in 1871-72 when even ceremonial ‘Muslim’ rule was over. Hindus and Sikhs constituted 73.5 percent of the population, and Muslims numbered 21.5 percent only. [Memorandum on the Census Of British India of 1871-72: Presented to both Houses of Parliament by Command of Her Majesty London, George Edward Eyre and William Spottiswoode, Her Majesty’s Stationary Office 1875, 16.]

In fact, this period of ‘Muslim rule’ was also the rule of the Hindu High Castes. According to contemporary ‘Hindu’ narratives, Aurangzeb never faced Shivaji in the battlefield; these were his two Rajput commanders, Jay Singh I and Jai Singh II, who fought against Shivaji on Aurangzeb’s behalf. Akbar personally never fought any battle against Rana Pratap of Mewar; Man Singh, brother-in-law of Akbar fought all battles against Rana. The Deewan Ala (prime minister) of both Shahjahan and Aurangzeb was Raghunath Bahadur, a Kayasth Hindu.[2]

It is nobody’s argument that Aurangzeb or many other ‘Muslim’ rulers were not religious bigots or tolerant. Aurangzeb did not spare his father, brothers, and many smaller ‘Muslim’ kingdoms of his times. There are also contemporary records that prove that Aurangzeb donated lands, money, and resources to many temples throughout India. Anybody who has visited Delhi’s Red Fort must have seen two temples; Jain Lal Mandir [Red Temple] and Gauri Shanker Temple, just across the Red Fort towards Chandni Chowk side. These temples were built before the rule of Aurangzeb and continued to function during his time and later.

Falsehood 3: According to RSS building of the Ram Temple was an important event for Hindus of all traditions 

Truth 3: They did not explain to the Nation why 4 Shankaracharyas of the Peetams (out of 5) established by Adi Shankaracharya boycotted the inauguration of the Ram Temple at Ayodhya. The most revered living Hindu saints of the Sanatan Dharm declared Ayodhya’s inauguration to be in contravention of Vedic scriptures, calling it Hinduism done for petty electoral gains.

It was sad to see the RSS run roughshod over the diversity of Hinduism. In its attempt to prove the homogenous character of Hindus, it turned a debate on the nature of the Ayodhya inauguration into Hindus versus others. The founder of Arya Samaj, Swami Dayanand Saraswati (1824-83), is glorified by RSS as a pillar of the Hindu nation. But Swami was an ardent opponent of the Brahmanical rituals like Pran Pratishtha, putting life into a lifeless idol (in Ayodhya case by Prime Minister Modi) and did not mince words in decrying this very ritual. He stated (in Satyarth Prakash or Light of Truth, chapter 11), “The fact of the matter is that the All-pervading Spirit [God] can neither come into an idol, nor, leave it. If your mantras are efficacious that you can summon God, why can you not infuse life into your dead son by the force of the very same mantras? Again why can you not bide the soul depart from the body of your enemy? There is not a single verse in the Vedas to sanction the invocation of the Deity and vitalization of the idol, likewise, there is nothing to indicate that it is right to invoke idols, to bathe them, install them in temples, and apply sandal paste to them.” 

Falsehood 4: According to the Hindutva narrative Ayodhya represents a five hundred years long war between Hindus and Muslims of India

Those who defend the demolition of Babri mosque argue that though sometimes presented as being a recent conflict, the fact is that this site has a long history of Hindus and Sikhs attempting to reclaim it, dating back to the early 19th century. Furthermore, the conflict has been ongoing regardless of the political party in power following India’s independence.

Truth 4: Ayodhya is presented as a place of perennial war between Hindus and Muslims, and the central dome of the Babri Mosque claimed to be the exact place where Ram was born, are modern ‘constructs’ as we will see in the following.

There cannot be a shoddier lie than this that Ayodhya was a place of perpetual war between Hindus against Muslims. During India’s War of Independence 1857, Ayodhya was the place where Maulvis and Mahants and ordinary Hindus and Muslims stood united in rebelling against the British rule and kissed the hangman’s noose together. Maulana Ameer Ali was a famous Maulvi of Ayodhya, and when Ayodhya’s well-known Hanuman Garhi’s (Hanuman Temple) priest, Baba Ramcharan Das, took the lead in organising the armed resistance to the British rule. Both of them were captured and hanged together on the same tree. In another instance of the glorious unity of Hindus and Muslims against the colonial rule at Ayodhya, Acchhan Khan and Shambhu Prasad Shukla led the army of Raja Devibaksh Singh in the area. Due to the treachery of Hindu and Muslim lackeys of the British, they were captured and killed together. The British rulers hated this unity and created narratives of perennial Hindu-Muslim conflict not only in Ayodhya but the whole of India.

Iqbal a renowned poet much maligned by the Hindutva ideologues whose poetry has been removed from textbooks wrote a peerless poem in praise of Ram in 1908 titled “Imam-e-Hind”. For Iqbal, Ram was not merely a Hindu God but “Imam-e-Hind” (spiritual leader of India). The first two lines of the poem read: Hai Raam ke wajood pe Hindustaan ko naaz/
Ahl-e-Nazar samajhte hain us ko Imam-e-Hind
(India is proud of the existence of Ram
Spiritual people consider him prelate of India).

The flag-bearers of Hindutva working overtime to undo a composite and all-inclusive India are using the Sikh factor as a bluff to legitimize its illegal project. Sikhs who do not believe in idol worship of Ram or any other Hindu God/Goddesses; we are told that on 28 November 1858, a Nihang Sikh [member of a warrior order within Sikhism] organized Pooja [worship] and havan [a Brahmanical ritual offering of grains, pure ghee and other such items to fire] in the Babri Mosque. It is unbelievable for a Sikh to perform Brahmanical rituals and would invite immediate ex-communication. Why Hindus at that time did not enter the Mosque is a mystery!

Aggrieved Muslims chose legal recourse and not community mobilisation, were they betrayed by the Judiciary?

Supremacist forces within Hindutva must understand that Ram was never the cause of perpetual conflict between Hindus and Muslims until RSS invented it as a convenient tool for religious polarization. Muslims of Ayodhya stopped going to Babri Mosque once the idol of Ram Lalla (child Ram) was smuggled into the Babri Mosque on the night of December 22/23 1949 with the connivance of local senior officials. Local Muslims did not try to break into the usurped Mosque, and there was no bloodshed engineered by Muslims of Ayodhya who were in substantial numbers in Faizabad, now rechristened as Ayodhya Dham despite the Indian Supreme Court declaring that “the mosque was desecrated by the installation of Hindu idols.”

The RSS and its affiliates instead of being ashamed of the carnage celebrate the demolition on December 6 as Shauriya Divas, day of bravery. These criminals have succeeded since 1990, RSS and its appendages had organized an aggressive campaign for demolishing the Babri Mosque, targeting Indian Muslims as Baber-zade/Haram-zade (children of Babar/illegitimate children). For more than two years, Hindus in India and abroad were asked to come to Ayodhya to tear down the mosque as kar-sevaks.

Babri mosque demolition was not a Hindu-Muslim battle but a seminal conflict between the RSS and the Secular Indian State

Did Muslims call for counter-mobilisation to save the mosque or reach the site on December 6 to confront the Hindutva mobs? Never! In fact, they trusted the RSS to honor the commitment made to the then-Indian Prime Minister, P. V. Narasimha Rao and the Indian Supreme Court that its appendages and cadres would not harm the mosque. RSS reneged on all commitments shamelessly. Indian State and judiciary remained silent spectators. How critically and fundamentally Indian Muslims were let down and even betrayed would be evident by the fact that Rao promised to rebuild Babri Mosque at its original place twice (once in Parliament and second time while addressing the nation from Red Fort on August 15, 1993), which were both promises that stand reneged on!

A detailed Video Narration of the sordid Ram Temple saga may be viewed here and here.

[1] PM’s speech during the Shri Ram Janmabhoomi Mandir Dhwajarohan Utsav, November 25, 2025, https://www.pmindia.gov.in/en/news_updates/pms-speech-during-the-shri-ram-janmabhoomi-mandir-dhwajarohan-utsav/

[2] ‘Fallacy of the Hindutva project’ May 4, 2022, Chennai, link: https://frontline.thehindu.com/cover-story/fallacy-of-the-hindutva-project-aurangzeb-mughals-islamophobia/article38484103.ece

Disclaimer: The views expressed here are the author’s personal views, and do not necessarily represent the views of Sabrangindia.

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The post Babri Mosque Demolition: When the Indian State succumbed to majoritarian propaganda appeared first on SabrangIndia.