|| ZAHOOR GULZAR ||
70- year-old Ghulam Rasool Bhat is sitting in a corner of the room, sobbing inconsolably. In a stumbling tone, Bhat, a farmer by profession is trying to re- call how is 18 -year-old son, a class 10 student, was set ablaze by a mob in Udhampur district. On October 9, Zahid Rasool, a truck conductor, was severely burnt after his truck carrying coal was attacked by a mob with petrol bomb in Udhampur over rumours of cow slaughter.
The truck was on way to Srinagar. Ramees Ahmad Bhat, who was accompanying Zahid but managed to flee from the scene after the mob attack is the lone survivor of the attack. He says that the mob first lobbed petrol bomb at the truck and when Zahid and he jumped out, the mob beat up Zahid and then set them ablaze Zahid was later shifted to Delhi, where he succumbed on the morning of October 18. His death has led to the widespread violence in Kashmir with protests and stone pelting incidents becoming the order of the day. Thousands of people participated in Zahid’s funeral in south Kashmir rais- ing Pakistani flag, shouting anti-India “
Zahid was dear to all of us. His death has me crippled within. There is darkness from all sides,” Zahid’s father Ghulam Rasool Bhat
and pro freedom slogans. Soon after his last rites were observed clashes broke out between angry protesters and security forces with police resorting to tear smoke shelling to disperse the protesters who retaliated by throwing stones and bricks. Since Zahid’s death, government has imposed curfew in his home town locat- ed in south Kashmir’s Anantag district. Several people have so far been injured while protesting against Zahid’s killing. “Zahid was dear to all of us. His death has me crippled within.
There is darkness from all sides,” Zahid’s father Gh- ulam Rasool Bhat said. The father added that Zahid decided to earn livelihood to provide some sought of relief to his family. “He was good at studies but he had to quit due to economic instability within our family. No one would have thought that such a profession would kill my son one day,” Bhat said. Two dead cows had been discovered in a river near the area where Zahid’s truck was attacked. Zahid’s death has come at that time when there were already heightened tensions over the consumption of beef in India after the lynching of a Muslim man wrongly accused of eating beef.
Zahid’s murder was not simply a Hindu versus Muslim case nor was it over the issue of hurting religious sentiments. It was a well- planned murder. The murder was a stark reminder to Kashmiris that they are living under an aggressive state that is hostile towards them
While rejecting any exgratia relief from the government, Bhat blamed the chief minister Mufti Sayeed of “playing politics over the blood of innocents.” “The government has given free hand to Hindu fanatics to go scot-free.” There were already simmering tensions in already restive Jammu and Kashmir state since a court ordered strict implementation of colonial era law banning cow slaughter and sale of beef in the state.
Another court while setting aside that order, recommended the state government review the law. Police have arrested nine attackers after they were identified from CCTV footage. The chief minister of the state, Mufti Mohammad Sayeed strongly criticised the killings, saying India could not allow “kangaroo courts”. The state BJP which is the coalition partner in the government in the state blamed some Kashmir based political leaders of issuing provocative statements which resulted in Zahid’s death. “There are leaders in Kashmir who their own vested interests gave provocative communal statements on the sensitive issues.
It is they who are responsible for the tragedy,” state BJP spokesperson Balbir Ram Rattantold said. But separatists in Kashmir are ac- cusing the government of encourag- ing the communal minded people of the state who, according to them, have been given free hand to carry deadly attacks on Muslims. “RSS-PDP coali- tion government has brought destruc- tion and miseries to people of Jammu and Kashmir and this coalition has en- couraged communal minded people in the state. We want the killers of Zahid be given the capital punishment- only then justice would be delivered to his soul,” separatist leader Syed Ali Gee- lani said. According to Mouris Bashir, a uni- versity student, the brutality by Hindu groups has not increased this year but it has just been more visible.
“Zahid’s murder was not simply a Hindu versus Muslim case nor was it over the issue of hurting religious sentiments. It was a well-planned murder. The murder was a stark reminder to Kashmiris that they are living under an aggressive state that is hostile towards them,” Mouris said. Saltanat Farooq, a research scholar and a columnist said the killings of Zahid and Mohamad Akhlaq of Dadri were interlinked as both were lynched in the name of religion. “If not religion then what was the motivating force that pressurised the Hindu mob for Dadri lynching episode? Love for reli- gion could not have been the base and fundamental reason for such an erup- tion of hatred that led to the merciless murder of a helpless middle aged man. Separated by miles yet same in fate as that of Akhlaq is Zahid’s story,” Farooq said.
