Why elected panchayat members in Kashmir are feeling caged

On the night of June 21, Ashaq Hussain Hurrah, a member of the block development council of Kashmir’s Baramulla district, attempted suicide inside his hotel room in Budgam. He had been confined to the hotel, 30 km from home, by the Jammu and Kashmir police ever since he had won the council election in October 2019.

“I want to live with my family and be with my kids,” he said, about a fortnight after the episode. “But the police tell us that there is a danger to our life. That’s why they have put all of us into private hotels and kept us under security.”

Jammu and Kashmir’s three-tier panchayati raj system, spanning village, block and district councils, is often showcased by the Narendra Modi government as evidence of functional grassroots democracy in the territory.

But many elected representatives like Hurrah are barely able to venture out, let alone perform their duties, since they are frequently targeted by militants. In March, militants attacked a meeting of block development council members in Sopore town, leaving a member and his personal security guard dead. In June, a municipal councillor from Bharatiya Janata Party was killed by militants in Tral.

Kashmir has more than 20,000 elected members of village panchayats, 307 block council members, and…

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