THE recent killing of Indian tourists in India-occupied Kashmir has once again reignited tensions between Pakistan and India. However, what is unfolding is not merely a tragic loss of life, but yet another chapter in New Delhi’s long-standing strategy of weaponising crises to justify further militarisation and territorial control in Jammu and Kashmir.

The pattern has been visible since 1947, and warrants urgent scrutiny and global reflection. It is vital to analyse the events in the last few decades which India orchestrated to increase tensions between the two countries.

Since the unlawful accession of Kashmir in 1947, India has masterfully crafted unrest and staged escalations to alter ground realities in its favour. Every phase of domestic strife or regional crisis has been manipulated as an opportunity for entrenchment rather than reconciliation.

The 1989 insurgency, for instance, saw Kashmiris rise for the right to self-determination, but it was swiftly labelled as a ‘security threat’, legitimising a brutal clampdown on Kashmiris and deploying hundreds of thousands of troops there. In 2016, the extrajudicial killing of Burhan Muzaffar Wani, a young activist, sparked mass civilian uprising.

Instead of addressing the root causes of alienation, India responded with pellet guns and curfews, suffocating civilian voices. The 2019 Pulwama attack in which a military convoy was bombed had been staged to generate a feverish war hysteria. What followed was the unpre-cedented Balakot airstrike, a dangerous escalation with nuclear undertones.

It was followed the same year by the unilateral and illegal abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A of India’s constitution. This constitutional rupture effectively dismantled Kashmir’s autonomy, and opened the floodgates for demographic and territorial engineering.

Fast-forward to 2025, and one can see that the tragic deaths of civilians are now being reframed as acts of ‘cross-border terrorism’, while evidence remains more whimsical than even circumstantial. India has swiftly moved to expand its surveillance grid, initiate fresh detentions, and grant security forces wider powers. There is a question that must be asked: who benefits from perpetual instability?

Is the Indian state not fostering a climate where every tragedy becomes a pretext for expanding its control?

If history is our guide — and it should be — conflict has repeatedly been used as a narrative instrument to justify the unjustifiable. The international community, including Pakistan, must confront this aggressive crisis diplomacy for what it truly is; a smokescreen for settler-colonial ambitions.

Kashmir’s story is not just of suffering; it is one of erasure, engineered under the guise of ‘security’. And every conflict, every ‘incident’ is a page in that deliberate script.

Tayyaba Masood Khan
Lahore

Published in Dawn, April 30th, 2025