Indian authorities have moved thousands of migrant workers in Kashmir to safer locations overnight, while hundreds have fled the Himalayan valley after a wave of targeted killings.
Suspected militants have killed eleven civilians, including five migrant workers, in Kashmir since early October despite a widespread security crackdown in the heavily militarised region.
While the trigger for the latest wave of attacks was not immediately clear, Kashmir has been the site of armed insurgency against New Delhi for decades. Kashmir is claimed in full by India and Pakistan but ruled in parts by both.
In other areas, security forces had intensified patrolling to prevent any militant activity, the official added.
The decision to move workers came after an attack on migrant labourers from Bihar on Sunday. Police said that militants barged into a rented room in Kashmir’s Kulgam district and fired at them, leaving two dead and one wounded.
Kashmir has gone through various bouts of violence over the years, but the latest wave of attacks appears to be targeted towards non-Kashmiris, including migrant workers, and members of the minority Hindu and Sikh communities in the Muslim-majority valley.
Indian migrant workers wait inside a railway station to board trains to their home states, on outskirts of Srinagar© Reuters/DANISH ISMAIL Indian migrant workers wait inside a railway station to board trains to their home states, on outskirts of Srinagar
The hundreds of thousands of migrant workers currently in Kashmir form the backbone of the region’s workforce in agriculture and construction.
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