Pakistani invasion of J&K in 1947: "Baramulla Massacre", when thousands were slaughtered by the Pakistani militias

 

The Baramulla massacre was a tragic event that took place during the Pakistani invasion of Jammu and Kashmir in 1947. In October 1947, tribal militias, backed by the Pakistani army, invaded the princely state of Jammu and Kashmir. Baramulla, a town in the region, witnessed a brutal massacre in the early stages of war.

 

During the invasion, tribal forces committed widespread atrocities, including killing, raping and looting. Baramulla was particularly affected, and many civilians lost their lives. It was a tragic and chaotic event, and various sources provide different figures, ranging from hundreds to thousands civilians killed.

 

According to Indian Defence Review (IDR), before the Indian Army landed in Srinagar and opposed the tribal onslaught, the invading hordes had laid waste everything that came their way. They pillaged Baramulla for four day in the most inhumane manner. The men and children were tortured and killed while the women were raped and carried back as sex slaves. Even the Nuns of the Convent there were raped and killed ruthlessly.

 

The Kashmiri Hindu community was identified for special treatment involving the most depraved form of torture and cruelty possible. Whole families committed mass suicide in the face of this brutal and merciless onslaught by jumping from roof tops or throwing themselves into the running waters of the Jhelum River.

 

According to the commentary by the European Foundation for South Asian Studies (EFSAS), on 26 October 1947 alone, the Pakistani intruders massacred about eleven thousand residents of Baramulla and destroyed the Mohra power station that supplied electricity to the capital city of Srinagar.

 

Sheikh Abdullah, the 'National Conference’ leader of J&K who later went on to become the first Prime Minister of J&K after its accession to India, described the tribal invasion eloquently at the UN Security Council on 5 February 1948, when he said that “The raiders came to our land, massacred thousands of people — mostly Hindus and Sikhs, but Muslims, too — abducted thousands of girls, Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims alike, looted our property and almost reached the gates of our summer capital, Srinagar”. Estimates of the total number of residents of J&K killed in the tribal invasion range between 35,000 to 40,000.

 

On the morning of 27 October, hundreds of Hindu, Sikh and Muslim women were raped and abducted, and many were carried away to Rawalpindi, Peshawar and other towns of Pakistan. For several days and nights the loot and plunder of Hindus and Sikhs continued in the entire Baramulla district.

 

The ease with which the invaders overran the thin and ill-prepared troops of J&K in Uri and Baramulla, the massive massacre of 26 October 1947 in Baramulla, and with the fall of Srinagar looking imminent, the panic-stricken Maharaja Hari Singh appealed to India to come to his rescue. He wrote in a letter dated 26 October 1947, “With the conditions obtaining at present in my State and to great emergency of the situation as it exists, I have no option but to ask for help from the Indian Dominion. Naturally they cannot send the help asked for by me without my State acceding to the Domination of India. I have accordingly decided to do so and I attach the Instrument of Accession for acceptance by your Government. The other alternative is to leave my State and my people to diabolical killers and beasts. On this basis, no civilized Government can exist or be maintained. The alternative I will never allow to happen as long as I am Ruler of the State and I have life to defend my country”.

 

With J&K formally and legally acceding to India, Indian troops landed in Srinagar on 27 October 1947 and defended the Srinagar city in the decisive battle of Shalteng on the outskirts of Srinagar on 7-8 November 1947.