Chattisinghpora, Pathribal, and Barakpora massacres

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The Chattisinghpora, Pathribal, and Barakpora massacres refer to a series of three closely related incidents that took place in the Anantnag district of Jammu and Kashmir between March 20, 2000 and April 3, 2000 that left up to 49 Kashmiri civilians dead.

Contents 1 The Chattisinghpora massacre 2 The Pathribal killings 3 The Barakpora killings 4 Pathribal DNA cover-up 5 Aftermath 6 References

[edit] The Chattisinghpora massacre

On the evening of March 20, 2000, 15-17 unidentified gunmen, dressed in Indian army fatigues, entered the village of Chattisinghpora, located in Anantnag district. They ordered all of the Sikh men and boys to assemble at the village gurdwara, and systematically shot and killed 34 of them. Many others were injured in the attack, and least one man later died of his injuries. A unit of Indian paramilitary Rashtriya Rifles stationed nearby failed to intervene during the attack. The attackers wore military uniforms, and were lead by a man they addressed as 'Commanding Officer.' At they withdrew, they allegedly shouted Hindu slogans, and left behind bottles of liquor.^[1] This was the first time in the Kashmir conflict that Sikhs had ever been targeted.^[1] In the aftermath of the attacks, Indian Home Minister LK Advani offered the state's Sikh population additional protective measures, however the local Sikh leadership reportedly rejected th plan, saying that the Muslim majority had not been hostile to them before and that no protection was needed.^[1]

The massacre, which took place on the eve of U.S. President Bill Clinton's visit to the Subcontinent, was widely condemned by both the Indian and Pakistani governments, as well as the leaders of the Kashmiri separatist movement. Although the Government of India and the state government of Jammu and Kashmir had not yet launched any official investigation into the massacre, they immediately accused two Islamist terrorist organizations, Lashkar e Tayyiba and Hizbul Mujahideen.^[1] The All Parties Hurriyat Conference however, accused the Indian government of carrying out the massacre to discredit the Kashmiri independence movement, while Syed Salahuddin, head of Hizbul Mujahideen said: "Mujahideen have nothing against the Sikh community which sympathizes with our struggle. We assure them that there never was and there will never be any danger to Sikhs from Kashmiri freedom fighters."^[1]

[edit] The Pathribal killings

Five days after the events at Chattisinghpora, on March 25, 2000, Indian military forces killed five men in Pathribal village of Anantnag district, claiming that the victims were the "foreign militants" responsible for the attacks. Official reports claimed that security forces had, after a gun fight, blown up the hut where the men were hiding, and had retrieved five bodies that had been charred beyond recognition. The bodies were buried separately without any postmortem examination.^[1]

Local observers and political activists doubted the Indian government's official reports however, pointing out that if there had been a gunfight, some of the security force personnel would have sustained injuries - but none were injured. Over the following days, local villagers began to protest, claiming that the men were ordinary civilians who had been killed in a fake encounter, not "foreign militants." According to them, up to 17 men had been detained by the police and "disappeared" between March 21-24. On March 30, local authorities in Anantnag relented to growing public pressure, and agreed to exhume the bodies and conduct an investigation into the deaths.

[edit] The Barakpora killings

With no action being taken with regards to the promised investigation into the Pathribal deaths, the local population grew increasingly restless. On April 3, 2000, an estimated 3-4,000 protesters marched to the city of Anantnag, where they intended to present a memorandum to the Deputy Commissioner demanding the exhumation of the bodies. When they reached the town of Barakpora, three kilometers before from Anantnag, some protesters began throwing stones at an Indian paramilitary camp. Members of the Central Reserve Police Force responded by opening fire on the protesters, killing 7 and injuring at least 15 more, of whom 1-2 later died of their injuries.^[1]

[edit] Pathribal DNA cover-up

On April 5, 2000, Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah ordered the exhumation of the bodies from the Pathribal killings, which began the next day. DNA samples were collected from the five bodies, as well as 15 relatives of the missing young men, and were submitted to forensic laboratories in Kolkata and Hyderabad. However, in March 2002 it was discovered that the DNA samples allegedly taken from the bodies of the Pathribal victims (all of whom were men) had been tampered with, when, according to a report from the Times of India, lab workers found that samples had in fact been collected from females.^[2] Fresh samples were collected in April 2002, which, upon testing, conclusively proved that the victims were innocent local civilians, and not foreign militants as the Indian government had been claiming for the past two years.^[3]

[edit] Aftermath

The parties responsible for the initial massacre at Chattisinghpora remain unidentified - various theories have been put forward accusing both Pakistani, Islamist militants, and Indian security forces. In August 2000, the Indian government announced that it had captured two Pakistan-based Lashkar e Tayyiba operatives, who, in December 2000, allegedly admitted to carrying out the attacks.^[4] Some have expressed doubt about the veracity of these admissions, given the government's involvement in the Pathribal killings and the subsequent cover-up. Independent inquiries by human rights activists from Punjab and the Ludhiana-based International Human Rights Organization have found that the attacks were most likely carried out by renegade troops from the Indian security forces.^[1]

[edit] References