The Pahalgam Pattern



Everyone is wiser after the event, including yours truly. When I look beyond the horror of the last few days of the Pahalgam terror attack that left 25 Hindus dead, I find recognizable patterns emerging from my own hazy memories of the past.

There of course is the centuries-old undeniable pattern of Islamic terrorism against the Kuffar — a pattern that we have become so blasé about that we now consider it a “fundamental human right” for Muslims to behave in such an entitled, chauvinist, supremacist, fascist, and violent manner that would dwarf the Nazis of any age. However, in my grieving mind there are other puzzle pieces that fit into the larger picture, of not just recent Pakistan-sponsored terror attacks in the valley of Kashmir and of the stereotypical reaction from so-called Kashmiri “civil society” (sic), but also of my earliest recollections of land jihad in Kashmir, especially the Pahalgam area in my own Anantnag district.

“Attack on Development” Pattern

On the 20th of October, 2024, LeT alias TRF terrorists opened fire inside a camp housing workers of a private company, who were working on an under-construction Z-Morh tunnel in Kashmir’s Ganderbal district, killing 6 migrant workers. TRF chief Sheikh Sajjad Gul, the mastermind of the attack and the group’s local module, posted a statement saying “The attack targeted a construction site where a billion dollar tunnel project, primarily for military transportation, is underway.”[1]

This was exactly two days after the bullet-riddled body of a migrant labourer, identified as Ashok Chauhan from Bihar, was found in Wachi area in Shopian district. The obvious pattern here is that non-Kashmiri migrant labourers and developmental projects are Pakistan’s primary targets in Kashmir.[2]

Now how does Pahalgam terror attack fit into this pattern? While the people targeted were not Kafir migrant workers per se, but Kafir tourists instead, the aim was the same: to stop the construction of the recently proposed Srinagar-Pahalgam highway — that will pass through Tral, the hometown of eliminated Hizbul Muhahideen terrorist commander Burhan Wani, while by-passing the usual route of Bijbehara, the hometown of Mehbooba Mufti.

Incidentally, the two local terrorists involved in the Pahalgam terror attack area residents of Tral and Bijbehara, respectively. Coincidentally, both areas are rat nests of Jamaati and Hizbul Mujahideen sympathisers, as well as workers of a pro-Jamaat and pro-terror “mainstream” political party. Make of this what you will.

“Civil Society Denial” Pattern

A conspiracy theorist like me should have suspected something was afoot when so-called civil society groups started opposing the construction of the new Srinagar-Pahalgam road citing “environmental concerns” in March 2025.[3]

The same concern for Kashmir’s ecology was expressed by professors and terrorist leaders like Shabir Shah[4] just a few weeks before the 10th July 2017 Amarnath Yatra massacre in which 8 Hindu pilgrims (seven of whom were women) were killed by Islamic terrorists en route from Amarnath Temple in the upper reaches of Pahalgam. Incidentally, Shabir Shah has amassed a lot of terror-begotten wealth and has major investments in Pahalgam itself!

Indeed, the same “environmental concern” was also shown by dead terrorist leader Syed Shah Geelani[5] in 2012 as well. It is so obvious that “academics” in tandem with Islamists want to contain and trim the scale of the Amarnath Yatra on any ruse and the green colour is interchangeably used for ecological and Islamic causes in Kashmir.

While the history of civil society opposition in tandem with terror attacks on Amarnath Yatra go way back,[6] earlier in this year itself, the MP of National Conference (the motherlode of all separatism sentiment in Kashmir) likened the Amarnath Yatra to a “cultural invasion”. It should come as no surprise to anyway that even as terrorism as an ideology is on the ventilator in Kashmiri society and pro-terror parties like PDP are dying out, it looks like NC is trying hard to emerge as the new rallying point of Kashmiri cultural chauvinism, separatism and anti-Hindu sentiment, yet again. It’s called a pattern, exactly because it repeats itself.

Then there are the patterns of denial exhibited by my Kashmiri “uncivil so-shitty” (pardon my French) again and again. My social media timeline on Facebook is rife with posts by friends and family and other users who are trying their best to deny that Kashmiri or Muslim terrorists were involved in the Pahalgam massacre. Some have even started claiming and insinuating that security forces themselves are involved in this “false flag operation”. Verily, after Pakistan sponsored Kashmiri Muslim terrorists killed tens of thousands of civilians of all religions over more than three decades, Pakistan sponsored Kashmiri Muslim terrorists “can do no wrong”. The cancer in Kashmiri conscience is so obvious, it’s palpable from outer space.

Then there are the “nice” deniers, who are savvy enough to understand that denial won’t do and hence don’t hesitate to denounce the tragic massacre, but, nevertheless, use subtle messaging to shift one’s attention away from the rot within Kashmiri society. They will say that, “Oh, apart from the 6 non-Kashmiri workers killed at Z-Morh, a local Kashmiri doctor was also caught in the fire,” or “Oh, apart from the 25 Hindus massacred in Pahalgam, a Kashmiri pony-walla was also a casualty.” Yes, indeed, so many locals have also been killed by Pakistan-sponsored Kashmiri Muslim terrorists… which is exactly why finding and circulating fake news that “Indian agencies enacted this massacre” or “Kashmiris have no record of terrorism” itself is a false flag. It smacks of a Sharad Pawar level of desperation to concoct a “13th terror attack” to distract from a dozen others, in a bid to tone down and assuage the nation’s justified anger. Question to the savvy Sharad Pawars of the world: Kabhi apni shakl dekhi hai?

“Baisaran” Pattern

The Baisaran meadow, to me personally, is a emblem of local greed and land jihad. Yes, you read that right. Do you know that, once upon a time, there was a narrow but decent motorable road starting from Pahalgam’s tourist hutment area and ending at this beautiful meadow? Well, the local pony-wallas would surreptitiously block this road by placing huge boulders and tree logs on this road, so much so that eventually, this road was years ago completely abandoned by the Pahalgam Development Authority.

The result is that now locals cannot afford to go there, what with the pony-wallahs charging too much for a ride to the meadow. Another outcome is that now it takes an hour to reach this meadow on foot or horse, which makes it relatively inaccessible for rapid security movement to the place, a fact the terrorists were well-aware of while planning the massacre.

The story of greed doesn’t end in Baisaran. Some 25 years ago, me and my friends went there in our car (yes, back then pony-wallas had not completely destroyed the road) and were shocked to find a big boulder at the edge of the meadow covered with green streamers and enclosed in a barbed-wire fence. Upon enquiring from a local Gujjar family, it turned out a WAQFesque land jihad had randomly, or perhaps strategically, converted the sport into a dargah overnight.

We were told that Sheikh Nooruddin, a.k.a. as the “Standard Bearer of Kashmiriyat”, had meditated on the boulder for “ten years”. As “proof”, we were shown a few holes on the boulder caused by erosion due to water drops falling on the rock surface from a pine tree next to it. We were told that these holes are “toe marks” of the saint, creating by him sitting on the rock for ten years, which left us imagining the saint returning to rock after answering the call of nature nearby and then inserting his toes in the aforementioned holes and then returning to meditation! We were also shown a smaller broken stone which purportedly was the “grindstone used by Sheikh Nooruddin to make sattu to eat.” So much for proof.

Back then, I found the Baisaran conversion to a dargah amusing, considering that there are so many places associated with the saint that one would think he lived for five centuries if he lived “ten years” in all of them. Looking back now, it was a clear case of daylight robbery or land jihad. It also serves as a warning not to overlook the so-called “Sufis and Rishis”, who in thought and action have hardly been different from their less-cuddly counterparts in Islam, when it comes to illegally usurping land.

The Sufi shrine at Bumzu is a case in point, which is built at the site of the more than thousand year old Bhimakeshava Temple, which could be seen intact as recently as the 1980’s but has since been completely “disappeared”.[7] But that pattern (of not recognising and preserving our Hindu cultural heritage) is to be expected from the Kashmiri Muslim “mainstream” where the cases against 22 at-Fatah separatists was dropped after the absurd 1975 Indira Abdullah Accord and all the accused were set free and rehabilitated into the “mainstream”, some of them entrusted with the role of protecting our heritage and retiring as Director General of Tourism Jammu & Kashmir[8] and even heading the Kashmir chapter of INTACH (Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage), when the only hifaazat they do is of the Asim Munir type, iykwim.

In the last couple of days after the Pahalgam massacre, I’ve been remembering other coincidental “incidents” from my life spent in Baisaran, Pahalgam, and nearby places — particularly the camping trip our Jamaat-run school took us to in the mid 80’s. We did not take the road to Baisaran; with our teachers leading us, we trekked and reached Baisaran from the forest side (which explains how the terrorists reached there). Our base camp was established at Aru, a valley above Pahalgam, where our school proudly held Friday congregations. “For the first time in history in this god-forsaken land,” we were told. During the same trekking trip, we came upon rocks on a mountain slope that were painted saffron, called Goswain Pal (in local parlance, “the rocks of the sadhus”), where an incident occurred that will forever be etched on my mind: Our teachers started peeing on the rocks, and the students followed suit. To paraphrase the poet Iqbal, incidentally, the historical personage on whose name our school was named, Islam is so egalitarian that it erases differences, here, between teachers and students:

“Ek hi saf mein mootne khade ho gaye Mahmood-o-Ayaz
Na koi banda raha aur na koi banda-nawaz”

It is therefore not in the least a surprise that some terrorists took the “path less trodden” to the meadow to massacre Hindus. Like one of the terrorists, our school head master was also a Jamaati from Tral (as was Burhan Wani, in case you don’t see the pattern). And talking patterns, our school also took us to attend an essay-writing competition in another place in Anantnag District where Vivekananda Kendra Nagadandi Ashram is located. In hindsight, it now looks like were taken by our Jamaati school on a recce to the ashram, since we did not go to the ashram using a road, but came and went trekking…

Being a resident of Anantnag and having witnessed the events leading up to the terrorism in Kashmir from close quarters, I can go on and on and recount the many patterns that flit before my eyes, the patterns that look like small gears moving a larger machine of religious intolerance and communalism and… but I’ve got to give it a rest. The whole point of this post is that patterns will repeat, because that’s what they do, unless and until we learn from our mistakes from the past and break the pattern.

So what did you learn today, Timmy?

©2025, Sualeh Keen

[1] https://www.livemint.com/news/pakbased-lashkar-offshoot-trf-claims-responsibility-for-kashmir-terror-attack-that-killed-7-including-a-doctor-11729485051613.html

[2] https://www.livemint.com/news/such-abhorrent-attacks-must-be-condemned-says-j-k-omar-abdullah-after-non-local-labourers-killing-in-kashmirs-sho-11729309546545.html

[3] https://rahstaexpo.com/articles/news/3613
https://www.greaterkashmir.com/business/gcc-opposes-road-project/

[4] https://kashmirreader.com/2017/06/05/experts-warn-threat-to-environment-by-amarnath-yatra/

[5] https://www.indiatoday.in/india/north/story/syed-ali-shah-geelani-threatens-stir-against-road-to-amarnath-shrine-119115-2012-10-18
https://www.dailyexcelsior.com/ecological-concerns-and-amarnath-yatra/

[6] https://x.com/AartiTikoo/status/884953418472628228

[7] https://www.facebook.com/sualeh.keen/posts/pfbid0RhjSwy4thVzVKaMxZTq8UaMhdqyjsQ8Uo8oFS7oGV4U5PzTDijJsrdUZhJ1jACghl

[8] https://kashmirlife.net/how-al-fatah-was-dismantled-vol-16-issue-14-358687/

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