Squiz Shortcuts - The conflict over Kashmir

Your Shortcut to… the conflict over Kashmir

After decades of relative peace, India and Pakistan have resumed fighting over Kashmir - an area at the foothills of the Himalayas that’s at the centre of a dispute between the 2 countries. The region has a long and complicated history, so in this Squiz Shortcut, we’ll get you across:

• how the conflict started

• why Kashmir is back in the headlines

• and why former US President Bill Clinton once called it “perhaps the most dangerous place in the world”

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Squiz the Shortcut

Let’s start by getting our bearings - where exactly is Kashmir?
First thing to note - Kashmir isn’t a sovereign nation; it’s a territory that sits to the north of India, and it’s divided into areas - one is controlled by India and the others are controlled by Pakistan and China. 

Why is it divided?
Both Pakistan and India lay claim to the entire region, but as it stands, it’s partly ruled by both… 

Got it. Why is it in the news?
A few weeks ago, on 22 April, militants hiding in the forest surrounding a picturesque valley called the Baisaran meadow in the Indian controlled part of Kashmir, opened fire on tourists. They killed 26 people - mostly Hindu men - and the attack was described as the worst on civilians in 2 decades.

Who was responsible?
A group called the Kashmir Resistance, also known as the Resistance Front, claimed responsibility. The group has been linked to Pakistani terror group Lashkar-e-Toiba (or LeT) which carried out a series of attacks across Mumbai in 2008 that killed 166 people. 

Was this a terror attack?
India says it was, and they say they’ve got evidence that Pakistan is backing the militants - which is something the Pakistani government denies. 

Did India respond?
Yes… Last week India retaliated with airstrikes into Pakistan and the Pakistan-controlled part of Kashmir - it says the strikes targeted bases run by both LeT and another terrorism group called Jaish-e-Mohammed. And the operation had a significant name…

What was it called?
Operation Sindoor - that’s a reference to the bright red powder Hindu women wear in their hair parting and as a dot on their forehead to signify they’re married. When they’re widowed, it’s wiped off, and reports say the name was a nod to the widows left after the meadow attack.

How many casualties were there from the Indian strikes?
At least 31 people were killed and 57 were injured as a result of Operation Sindoor. It prompted attacks from Pakistan, and the 2 sides traded strikes for most of last week in what seemed like a resumption of the long-running feud over Kashmir. Both countries have nuclear weapons in their arsenals, and world leaders have been urgently calling for them to calm things down.

And did they cool it?
A truce was reached over the weekend - but both sides have accused each other of breaching it, and India says it’s just “a pause”, so things are still tense. As we mentioned, there’s a lot of history involved…

Let’s get into it… How did the conflict start?
Strap in, we’re going back to August 1947, when the Indian subcontinent gained independence from the British, who colonised it for roughly 200 years. When the British left, they put in place a partition plan that divided it along religious lines into majority Hindu India and majority Muslim Pakistan. Kashmir, which sits in the middle of the 2, was free to join whichever one it wanted to at the time. 

Which one did it choose?
Back then, the Hindu maharaja, or local Princely ruler (his name was Hari Singh), wanted the region to become independent but after Pakistani tribes invaded in October 1947, he chose to join India in return for its help defending the invasion. But that decision sparked a war between India and Pakistan over the territory…

How long did it last?
The fighting stopped in 1949 when the UN intervened and the 2 sides signed an agreement to divide Kashmir along what’s known as the Line of Control. To this day, it remains one of the most heavily militarised borders in the world - even though it’s not recognised as an international border. 

How does it work?
It was formally agreed on between the 2 sides after another war in the 60s, and the deal is that Pakistan administers, or controls, the northern and western parts, and India administers the central and southern parts known as Jammu and Kashmir. China also controls a small part to the north. 

Have there been other wars since then?
A brief fight broke out in 1999 between India and Pakistani-backed militia, and by that stage, both sides had nuclear weapons. It was resolved when the US got involved to broker a peace deal. It was just after this that the US President at the time, Bill Clinton, described the Line of Control as “perhaps the most dangerous place in the world”. 

Why was that?
Because of the nuclear capacity of both sides, and the fact that an all-out war between them would’ve led not only to the deaths of thousands of people, but also it would’ve potentially devastated the agricultural crops that feed the billions of people that live on the subcontinent… But, as we mentioned, Clinton convinced them to back down, and for the most part, since then things have remained calm.

For the most part?
Yep… With the exception of occasional flare-ups by resistance fighters who believe Kashmir should be under Pakistani rule, given its Muslim majority, or that it should have its own independence - but neither Pakistan nor India are showing any signs of agreeing to that… 

Got it, so what’s triggered the latest violence by resistance fighters?
One important thing to note is that, up until 2019, Indian administered Kashmir had a special status granting it limited autonomy, but that was revoked by PM Narendra Modi in 2019 as part of a security crackdown following a suicide bombing that killed 40 Indian paramilitary police… 

How did that go down?
The move was largely welcomed across India, but reports say it angered some people within Jammu and Kashmir - especially a new ruling that allowed outsiders to buy land in the region for the first time.

Why is that?
The area is still 60% Muslim, which makes it the only part of India where Muslims are in the majority, and the move by Modi’s political party was seen as an attempt to affect that. One of the so-called reasons given by the Kashmir Resistance militants for the Baisaran meadow attack on Hindu tourists was that 85,000 "outsiders" had been settled in the region, spurring what they called a "demographic change."

Have there been attempts at a diplomatic level to establish peace?
There were attempts by the countries’ leaders to resolve the long-running conflict in the early 2000s, but negotiations stalled after the 2019 attack, and now things are looking shakier than ever…

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Onto our Recommendations

Reading: This map along with this article about each side’s military capabilities will help you to understand the boundaries and what’s at stake in the conflict.

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