India: Human rights abuses in the election period in Jammu and Kashmir

Amnesty International has over the last months monitored with increasing concern the grave human rights situation in Jammu and Kashmir, particularly against the backdrop of the first elections in the state since 1989. Amnesty International fears for the human rights of people in Jammu and Kashmir in the period before and during the forthcoming state assembly elections scheduled to take place in September 1996. Immediately before and during the April/May elections to the Indian union parliament, the Lok Sabha, human rights violations appear to have reached a new peak. Prominent citizens, human rights defenders, journalists and political leaders have been particularly at risk of human rights abuses by government security forces, by militias under government control and by armed opposition groups. These included 23 members of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front who were reportedly deliberately killed by state police in March; lawyer and human rights defender Jalil Andrabi whose body was found floating in the Jhelum three weeks after his reported arrest by the paramilitary Rashtriya Rifles; several members of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference whose homes were on innumerable occasions the targets of attack, apparently by members of militant groups who had surrendered to the government; and Ghulam Hassan Pinglana, a former parliamentarian of the Indian National Congress in his seventies was shot dead in his village home in Pulwama district, allegedly by members of an armed opposition group in April. During the elections, many members of the civilian population complained that they were caught between militant groups who threatened to abuse people who participated in the elections and the army and the so-called renegades threatening violations against those who did not. The organization urges the Government of India to take all possible measures to ensure that the coming elections to the state assembly are not marred by further human rights violations. It also calls on the government to promptly set up impartial and independent inquiries into every reported human rights violation in Jammu and Kashmir, including torture and threats of torture, extrajudicial executions and arbitrary arrests of political prisoners with the view to bringing perpetrators to justice. Amnesty International urges the Government of India to provide all necessary protection to human rights defenders including journalists so that they may pursue their tasks without fear for their lives and safety. The organization also urges all armed opposition groups to desist from the practices of hostage-taking, torture and deliberate killing of civilians which are prohibited under humanitarian law. The current paper, prepared in mid-June 1996, is entirely based on reports which Amnesty International has received from human rights activists, local and foreign journalists and victims or victims' families in Jammu and Kashmir, as the organization has not so far been granted permission to visit the state. During a visit to New Delhi in July 1996, a delegation of Amnesty International submitted the report to officials in the Ministry of Home Affairs with a request for comment. By the time this report went to print, Amnesty International had not received a response.