Kashmiri civilian goes ‘missing’ from Indian army’s custody

On December 21st, a family from Kashmir’s Kunan Poshpora village demanded the return of a family member, Abdul Rashid Dar, who was illegally detained by the Indian army and interrogated in custody. The Kashmiri civilian was jailed on 15th December. After detaining him, the army had told the family members that he would return the following day, but he never returned and the next day, on 16th December, the army claimed that he had gone ‘missing’ from their custody. “How could he disappear amid hundreds of troops?”, the family members asked and rejected the army’s narrative about Rashid disappearing. Rashid was a driver by profession and a breadwinner, and his detention and now disappearance has inflicted great trauma on his loved ones. The mother of Abdul Rashid said that her son was having dinner with his family when the army raided the house and arrested him without providing any grounds. “The army did not inform any of the family members about the grounds as to why Rashid was being detained. I told the army that my son was innocent, but they robbed me of him!”, she said. The brother of Abdul Rashid stated that he reached out to the army officers through various means but the relevant officers kept denying the family any meeting on one pretext or another^[9]. The Indian army in Kashmir has a history of detaining Kashmiri men and then claiming that they have gone ‘missing’, only for their dead bodies to be discovered later in the form of unmarked graves, tortured, burnt, and mutilated^[10].

[9] https://thekashmiriyat.co.uk/kunan-poshpora-family-stages-protest-as-youth-allegedly-goes-missing-in-army-custody/

[10] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jul/09/mass-graves-of-kashmir