When the Modi government scrapped the special status of Jammu and Kashmir on August 5, placing the region under lockdown, the men in the Pa...
When the Modi government scrapped the special status of Jammu and Kashmir on August 5, placing the region under lockdown, the men in the Pandit family were worried. “On August 6, two of my sons and I stayed away from home because of the situation,” said Ghulam Rasool Pandit, who lives in Karimabad village in South Kashmir’s Pulwama district. “But my youngest son, Mamoon, said he would stay home because he didn’t want to leave his mother and sisters alone.”
Ghulam Pandit’s eldest son, Naseer Ahmed Pandit, was a constable in the Jammu and Kashmir Police but in March 2015, he fled with two rifles and joined the militant group Hizbul Mujahideen. Naseer Pandit would become part of a famous band of militants headed by Burhan Wani, the Hizbul Mujahideen commander whose killing triggered mass protests in July 2016. Months before Wani’s killing, Naseer Pandit had been killed in a gunfight with security forces in April 2016.
In the last few years, the Pandit family has grown accustomed to sudden visits by the Indian Army and the police. On August 6, they paid another visit. “A group of SOG personnel raided our house around 2 am on August 6 and picked up Mamoon,”...
