A migrant worker, Shubham Kumar, was injured in an attack by militants in an outlying village in Tral, which is around 45 km south of Srinagar, on Thursday. This comes after nine people were killed in two separate incidents in the last one week.

A resident of Uttar Pradesh’s Bijnore district, Kumar works at a salon and is the latest victim of militant violence in the Valley. The attack comes after seven non-native workers and a doctor were shot dead by militants in two separate attacks in Ganderbal and Shopian districts within a week. 

On October 18, the bullet-scarred body of a migrant worker was recovered from a remote village in Shopian. Barely two days later, on October 20, militants stormed a tunnel construction site, shooting seven migrant workers and a doctor. All victims succumbed to injuries. 

These incidents indicate a spate in targeted killings, similar to those that occurred in 2021 and 2022, spurring migrant workers and members from minority communities to flee the Valley. Between January 2021 and October 2022, 55 civilians were killed. In 2022 alone, militant attacks left 29 civilians, including 6 Hindus and 8 migrant workers, dead. 

Migrant workers 

Every year in March, thousands of migrant workers make a beeline for Kashmir Valley to earn a livelihood. Workers, both Hindus and Muslims, make up a significant portion of the region’s workforce. Rough estimates suggest that around 4 lakh non-local workers from Bihar, West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab  arrive in the Valley every year. They are primarily employed in sectors like construction and agriculture.

It is the higher wages that draw these workers to the Valley. 

In 2022, however, targeted killings prompted an exodus of thousands of workers, resulting in a spike in labour costs and leaving the Valley reeling under an acute shortage of labour. 

The recent attacks could instil fear among them and compel them to return. Following these attacks, reports about the local administration asking these workers to leave the Valley started doing rounds. The police, however, dismissed such reports as false and baseless.

Former Chief Minister and PDP president Mehbooba Mufti, in a social media post, had said that pressuring the migrant workers to leave would give out a bad message and might cause an outrage against Kashmiris working and studying in other parts of the country. 

A migrant worker, however, told businessline that they had been asked by the administration to be vigilant. 

Return in attacks 

The attacks on the non-native workers and minority community witnessed a spike particularly after the Union government scrapped the special constitutional provision of Jammu and Kashmir on August 5, 2019. The Resistance Front, which the police believes is an offshoot of Lashkar-e-Toiba, claimed the responsibility for these attacks. 

Since 2023, however, such attacks had declined in Kashmir. But they made a comeback shortly after the Valley hosted the final match of the Legends League Cricket ( LLC), which drew an unprecedented crowd, and the first-ever international marathon. Both these events were aimed to telegraph a message of peace in Kashmir. 

Political observers believe that normalisation did not go down well with the peace spoilers. 

“To make themselves relevant, they are resorting to such attacks”, said a political analyst, who wished to remain anonymous. 

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