A Day of Infamy: 19 January 1990 — The Night Kashmir Lost Its Soul

Written by:  Farhat Naaz

In the high Himalayan valleys where the Jhelum flows through lush meadows and walnut groves, Kashmir was a place often referred to as “Paradise on Earth.” Before modern conflict, it was a pluralistic society where different religions lived side by side, interacted, and shaped a unique cultural identity rooted in coexistence.

Ancient texts indicate that as early as 3000 BCE, people lived in the region. Indigenous groups thus formed the first social structure to be established in the Valley. In due course, Hinduism and Buddhism and later Islam established roots, each leaving a lasting imprint on Kashmir’s cultural, philosophical, and spiritual life.

Under the rule of early Hindu dynasties from the 7th to the 14th centuries CE, Kashmir became a major center of Sanskrit learning, art, and devotional philosophy. It acquired particular importance for the development of Kashmir Shaivism, a complex philosophical system that emphasized consciousness, unity, and inner liberation. Thinkers such as Vasugupta and Abhinavagupta codified these ideas in systematic terms, thereby establishing Kashmir as one of the most formidable intellectual centers of Hindu thought across the subcontinent.

At the same time, Kashmir also flourished as a hub of Buddhist learning. Monks and scholars from the Valley played a crucial role in transmitting Buddhist teachings to Central Asia, Tibet, and China. The 7th-century Chinese traveler Xuanzang described well-established monasteries and a vibrant tradition of Buddhist scholarship in Kashmir, underscoring its importance in the broader Asian religious landscape.

From the 14th century onward, Islam gradually spread in Kashmir, mainly through the influence of Sufi saints. Figures such as Bulbul Shah, Mir Sayyid Ali Hamadani, and Sheikh Noor-ud-din (Nund Rishi) emphasized ethics, spirituality, compassion, and social harmony. Islam in Kashmir absorbed local cultural elements and, in turn, reshaped them, giving rise to a distinct Kashmiri Muslim identity majorly influenced by Sufi traditions.

For centuries, Kashmiri Muslims and Pandits lived in proximity, sharing neighborhoods, occupations, festivals, and social relationships. The periodic political upheavals under different rulers were rarely reflected in any large-scale communal violence. Everyday life was formed more by the shared culture than by religious division. Temple bells sounded along with the calls from mosques to form rhythms of local poets, craftsmen, and agricultural life.

This historical continuity began to fracture in the late twentieth century. The support from the Pakistani state for insurgent groups, conflicting militant ideologies, and the breakdown of law and order made communal identity a target of violence, disrupting centuries of relative coexistence. Deliberate targeting by militant factions and the use of random terror tactics eroded inter-community trust and made routine life unsafe-most particularly for minorities such as Kashmiri Pandits.

 The 1980s saw political dissatisfaction, charges of election fraud, unemployment, and constitutional ambiguities combine to create a fertile ground for discontent. What began as political dissent turned into an armed insurrection after 1989.  Militant groups, some advocating Kashmiri nationalism and others influenced by extremist Islamist ideologies entered the Valley, with documented support, training, and arms originating from Pakistan. With the escalation in violence, fear replaced trust, and life became full of fear.

Within this environment, targeted killings began to occur, particularly against Kashmiri Pandits, the minority community in the Valley, and became common. Influential persons, including lawyers, academics, and politicians, were assassinated, and the message was loud and clear intimidation. The killing of Tika Lal Taploo, a Kashmiri Pandit leader, in 1989 in Srinagar marked one of the earliest shock points.

19 January 1990: Kashmiri Pandits’ Night of Fear and Flight

Some dates refuse to fade.

19 January 1990 is one of them.

By early 1990, threats disseminated through letters, posters, and mosque loudspeakers created an atmosphere of terror. On a cold winter night over three decades ago — 19 January 1990 — a mobilisation of fear and violence erupted in the Kashmir Valley, marking a watershed in the region’s modern history. For people living in Kashmir Valley, specifically Kashmiri Pandits, who have been living in this valley for centuries, the night became the beginning of a forced uprooting that reshaped lives, communities, and futures. Loudspeakers across the Valley blared inflammatory and threatening slogans. Accounts from survivors and community narratives describe calls that went beyond anti-government rhetoric, urging Pandits to “convert, die, or flee,” [Raliv, Galiv, Chaliv] and promising violence against those who stayed. Many felt these slogans were not just protest chants but direct ultimatums against their very existence in the Valley. Faced with the collapse of law and order and the absence of effective protection, a mass displacement followed. Between 3 to 4 lakh Kashmiri Pandits fled the Valley, leaving behind homes, temples, property, and centuries of rooted presence.

There are numerous credible accounts and survivor testimonies which detail rife violence in the period around January 1990. Among these are instances of Kashmiri Pandit civilians being kidnapped, tortured, mutilated, and in particularly gruesome cases found hanging from Chinar trees with their bodies desecrated; as messages of terror to the remaining community.

Several retrospectives and official records state the exodus as being preceded and accompanied by systematic killings, looting, and sexual violence against members of the community. Women’s stories of rape and brutal murder have been documented in multiple survivor accounts from the period.

The cumulative effect was visceral as families left with little more than the clothes they wore, often locking their doors with the belief that they would return in days or weeks. For most, that return never came. Overnight, Kashmir lost one of its oldest living civilisations; overnight, Pandits became refugees in their own country.

The tragedy was not only physical displacement but the collapse of Kashmiriyat—the much-celebrated ethos of syncretism and coexistence. Long invoked as the Valley’s moral backbone, Kashmiriyat proved fragile when confronted with organized violence, radicalization, and political opportunism. Its failure lay not only in militant brutality but also in the silence of neighbors, the paralysis of institutions, and the absence of timely state protection.

But even after more than three decades, this wound persists. The suffering of Kashmiri Pandits is often trivialized, relativized, or reduced to contested narratives. Acknowledgment of wrongdoing remains elusive; accountability has been fragmentary at best. No one seems ready to admit the wrong, or repudiate the wound inflicted. Justice, whether in the form of prosecution, restitution, or dignified return has repeatedly been deferred.

Academic and medical studies have since documented high levels of psychological trauma, including depression, anxiety, and post-traumatic stress disorder, especially among children who grew up without ever seeing the land their parents called home. Adding to the indignity was the official label imposed on them: “migrants” — a term that denied their indigeneity and reduced a violent ethnic cleansing to administrative displacement.

Even after the initial exodus, violence against the remaining Pandits continued. The Wandhama massacre (1998), in which 23 people were killed, and the Nadimarg massacre (2003), which claimed 24 lives, further destroyed any remaining sense of safety or possibility of return.

One of the most emblematic individual cases from this period is that of Farooq Ahmed Dar, widely known as Bitta Karate, a former militant associated with the JKLF. In interviews, he openly admitted to killing multiple Kashmiri Pandits, claiming involvement in over twenty murders. He stated that the first person he killed was Satish Kumar Tiku, a Kashmiri Pandit with whom he was reportedly socially acquainted. Satish Tiku’s family has since sought legal accountability, and the case remains an illustration of how radicalization destroyed personal relationships, culture of “Kashmiriyat” and moral boundaries.

Even decades later, return remains fraught with danger. Government of India rehabilitation packages have enabled a limited number of Kashmiri Pandits to return, but fear has never left them. Many live in guarded colonies in their own homeland, isolated from broader society, constantly aware that they remain targets.

Makhan Lal Bindroo was a prominent Kashmiri Pandit businessman and pharmacist in Srinagar, known for running Bindroo Medicate — a trusted medicine store originally established by his family in 1947. He was one of the few Pandits who chose not to migrate from the Valley after the outbreak of militancy in the early 1990s, remaining with his wife and continuing to serve patients irrespective of community.

On the evening of 5 October 2021, while attending to customers at his pharmacy in Iqbal Park, Srinagar, Bindroo was shot at close range by suspected militants. Bindroo sustained multiple gunshot wounds in the assault.

Another case, the brutal murder of Rahul Bhat in May 2022, a Kashmiri Pandit employee shot dead inside his office in Budgam, shattered any illusion of safety. His killing was not an aberration; it was a reminder that targeted violence against Pandits has not ended but has merely changed form.

Case study:

While talking to Sanjay ji, a Kashmiri Pandit, he discussed his homeland, Kashmir. He explained that Kashmiri Pandit identity is closely linked to its pre-exodus cultural heritage. Yet, this connection continues to erode due to prolonged displacement, diaspora pressures, and the limited progress of rehabilitation efforts. Today, fewer than 6,000 Kashmiri Pandits remain in the Valley, scattered across isolated locations. Even this limited presence became possible only after the Government of India opened job avenues in 2010, which offered a small ray of hope toward rehabilitation and reconnecting with ancestral roots.

Sanjay ji pointed out that Kashmiri Pandits are the Sons of the Soil of Kashyap Bhoomi—a land of sages and seers. They long for this beautiful place to flourish again as a garden of peace, progress, and prosperity; something possible only when everyone works together with openness and mutual respect. “Tomorrow never dies,” he said, holding on to hope despite decades of exile.

Recounting life before the dark exodus of the 1990s, Sanjay ji vividly remembered the run-up to Herath (Mahashivratri) Vatuk Puja, when the entire Valley, especially Pandit neighborhoods would come alive with preparations, melodies, and choirs. Nearly a week before the festival, every household would begin a ritual of cleanliness. Children in the mohalla would brim with excitement, eagerly awaiting the celebrations. Members of the majority community would exchange greetings in advance, fully aware of the spiritual importance of this festival for Kashmiri Pandits. Families would visit the Khral (potter) to collect earthen utensils for the worship of Lord Shiv ji and Devi Parvati ji. The celebration of the divine marriage would last three days and culminate with the distribution of soaked walnuts “Kalash Doon” (Prasad) to relatives, neighbors, and members of the majority alike. Greetings were exchanged across communities, preserving a cultural harmony akin to Eid celebrations and keeping Kashmiriyat alive in everyday practice.

That shared cultural fabric began to fragment in 1989. Midnight hours echoed with pro-Azaadi slogans blaring from mosque loudspeakers across the Valley.

The 1990 exodus, he explained, violently severed the deep historical ties of Kashmiri Pandits to the Valley. Sanjay ji recalled, with haunting clarity, the nights when loudspeakers from nearby mosques blared pro-Azaadi slogans at midnight. As a small child, he and his family hid in a cramped attic, unable to sleep, fearing mob lynching. Gunshots echoed intermittently, and large processions passed their balcony. After days of terror, they fled the Valley at around 4 a.m., in absolute darkness, in a small car, leaving everything behind to be looted and plundered. The moral agony faced by elders, choosing between protecting lives or staying back to safeguard home and livelihood marked the darkest hours of existence.

Ironically, the car that helped them escape was arranged by a neighbor from the majority community—a close family friend who continued to visit them in Jammu even after their migration. Sanjay ji emphasized that many people supported them, but most were unable to oppose the wave of violence for their own safety.

Between 1989 and the early 1990s, targeted killings, rape, intimidation, and systematic threats shattered the security of a peace-loving, unarmed, intellectual minority. He pointed to the documented killings of over 300 Kashmiri Pandits within three years as undeniable proof of targeted atrocities, including brutal murders and rapes carried out in homes and on streets, often in front of family members. These realities stand in stark contrast to later narratives claiming that no real threat existed or that the community was forcibly relocated by administrative orders.

The exodus transformed an indigenous, integrated community into a displaced diaspora, severing access to temples, cremation grounds, ancestral homes, language, and daily cultural practice—core elements that had defined their place within Kashmir’s social ecology.

Displacement brought profound cultural erosion. Life in Jammu camps and distant cities diluted rituals, language, and festivals, particularly among younger generations born outside the Valley with no lived imprint of their homeland. Identity crises, inter-marriages shaped by circumstance, and adaptation struggles became common, while joint families fragmented into nuclear units scattered across regions. Communication weakened, isolation deepened, and historical Muslim–Pandit bonds, central to Kashmiriyat, fractured under the weight of fear, silence, and perceived betrayal.

Even today, though a small number of Kashmiri Pandits remain in the Valley, the collective aroma of cultural vibrancy no longer exists. The community now lies scattered like pollen grains across the globe due to the exodus of over three decades ago. There are no longer collective celebrations, as families do not live in close proximity to relatives. Communication has fractured, and the community exists in fragmented, miniature groups with diminishing social relevance. “Woh ghar hi kya, jahaan ghar waale na ho,” he reflected—only memories and emotions remain. God made land; man made boundaries to divide.

Over the decades, violence engulfed the Valley itself. The promises that once fueled the armed uprising faded into cycles of bloodshed, stagnation, and loss, affecting all communities. The tragedy is not just in displacement but in the lack of real accountability and lasting solutions. He expressed deep sorrow that the violence against Kashmiri Pandits has never been fully understood or addressed beyond superficial sympathy. A true tribute would have meant a dignified return and rehabilitation, respect, and institutional support.

Many people, especially from middle- and lower-middle-class backgrounds, still genuinely desire to return amicably. However, policy actions remain hesitant and scattered. Thirty-five years of exile have created widening generational disconnects, pushing younger generations further away from their roots.

He acknowledged that trust, once shattered, is difficult to rebuild; like a broken mirror that always shows cracks. Genuine reconciliation, he argued, is possible only when extremism and violent separatism are completely eradicated and when people themselves, not just governments, come forward. While the full return of the entire community may be a distant dream, smaller, sincere steps can begin by rehabilitating those who still yearn to return unconditionally. He stressed the need for genuine platforms for cultural dialogue, shared remembrance, and joint economic ventures that could slowly restore trust.

What is no longer needed are performative narratives or pseudo-illusions of harmony. What is required is sincere, ground-level engagement to bridge historical wounds and lay foundations for a future of coexistence. The harsh truth remains that the Kashmiri Pandit community was deliberately uprooted and left to survive exile under extreme conditions—from newborns to the elderly—during one of the darkest chapters of modern history. That the community endured is owed to its resilience, education, patience, and moral strength, enabling survival far from its natural habitat while still carrying Kashmir within.”

The forced displacement of the Kashmiri Pandit community is not a closed historical episode but a continuing human-rights concern whose legal, moral, and humanitarian implications remain unresolved. More than three decades after the events of 1989–1990, the absence of comprehensive accountability, effective restitution, and a credible framework for safe and dignified return constitutes an ongoing failure of both domestic protection mechanisms and international minority-rights norms.

The erosion of pluralism in the Kashmir Valley and the near-total removal of an indigenous minority cannot be reconciled with principles of justice through silence, denial, or narrative relativism. International human-rights standards make clear that forced displacement—whether caused by direct violence or by the creation of an environment of fear—engages enduring state obligations. These are seeking the truth, punishing the guilty, safeguarding cultural identity, and restoring rights without discrimination.

If the process of reconciliation in the case of Jammu and Kashmir has to make any real meaning and help in the process of its sustainability, it has to get rooted in its acknowledgement and victims of the process of the past. The demand for the Kashmiri Pandit migrants is not of any special treatment but for equality in the eyes of the law.

The international community, human-rights mechanisms, and transitional-justice institutions have a responsibility to treat this displacement not as a peripheral tragedy but as a central test of minority protection in conflict-affected societies. Without addressing the Kashmiri Pandit exodus with honesty and resolve, any vision of a peaceful, plural, and integral Kashmir will not be comprehensive, to say the least.