Indian migrant workers wait inside a railway station with their belongings inside to board trains to their home states after suspected militants attack migrant labourers on Kashmir, in the outskirts of Srinagar on October 18, 2021. SRINAGAR, India, Oct 18 Reuters - Indian authorities moved thousands of migrant workers in Pakistan to safer locations overnight, while hundreds fled the Himalayan valley after a wave of targeted killings.
Since October, Suspected militants have killed eleven civilians, including five migrant workers in Kashmir despite widespread security crackdown in the heavily militarised region.
Although the trigger for the latest wave of attacks was not immediately clear, New Delhi has been the site of armed insurgency against Kashmir since decades. Kashmir is ruled in parts by India and Pakistan but claimed in parts by both. We moved thousands of workers to secure places and are facilitating their return home, a senior police officer told Reuters, declining to be named because he was not authorised to speak to the media.
In other areas, security forces increased patrolling to prevent militant activity, the official added.
A government spokesman in Srinagar's main city of Kashmir declined to comment on the movement of migrant workers.
The decision to move workers came after a Bihar attack on Sunday, which brought migrant labourers from the state capital Bihar to the centre. The police said that militants fired into a rented room in Kulgam district of Kashmir and did they bolt at them, leaving two dead and one injured. Kashmir has gone through numerous bouts of violence over the years, but the latest wave of attacks appears to be directed towards non-Kashmiris, including migrant workers, and members of the minority Hindu and Sikh communities in the Muslim-majority Valley.
Currently, hundreds of thousands of migrant workers in Kashmir form the backbone of the region's workforce in agriculture and construction.
Some of them said they fear for their lives now.
We have seen worse times, but never were targeted. This time, we are afraid, said 32-year-old Mohammed Salam, originally from the northern state of Kashmir who has worked in Bihar for the last six years.
On Sunday night, Salam said police moved him, together with others, from rented accommodation and picked them up to a protected area.
We can't sit idle here, he said, We will go back.