Nomadic shawl sellers from the Indian region of Kashmir told VOA on Friday that extremist Hindu groups are harassing, threatening and hindering them from selling their goods in the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh. Hindu groups claim that local shopkeepers suffer business losses when nomadic vendors sell their goods nearby.
Bilaspur district superintendent of police Sandeep Dhawal admitted in Friday’s edition of the Indian Express, a leading Indian newspaper, that more than a dozen shawl sellers had filed a complaint at the Ghumarwin police station.
Dhawal said a similar dispute had arisen last year between Kashmiri hawkers and local shopkeepers, who claimed financial losses due to the vendors.
“No physical attacks have been reported,” he told The Indian Express. “We have requested the Deputy Commissioner office in Bilaspur to mediate and resolve the issue amicably. A meeting between the two sides is expected in the next day or two.
The Indian Express reported that senior officials blamed “commercial rivalry” between Kashmiri vendors associated with the Ghumarwin trade circle and local shopkeepers for the harassment claims. Police investigation is going on.
The traders said they have been visiting the area for more than 30 years, but this year they have been facing threats and pressure to leave the state, where they stay for a few months annually.
Vendors from Kashmir sell leather jackets, socks, bags and Kashmir-handmade pashmina shawls. They also sell women’s suits. They move to different states of India to sell these items in early November and return after March. They carry their goods on their shoulders and sell them wherever they find a customer.
“For the last three days some Hindu extremist groups have forced us to stop selling our goods. They ask us to pack our things and go back to Kashmir,” a businessman currently living in Ghumarwin area of Bilaspur in Himachal Pradesh told VOA on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisal.
“These threats and intimidation used to happen occasionally, but this year when we go to the market to buy food and other essential goods, we are abused there too,” he said. He said that it has become difficult for him to even step out of his rented accommodation.
The trader said he and his fellow vendors asked Hindu groups if they considered Kashmiris less Indian.
“We also told them, ‘If people from other parts of India can work in Kashmir, why can’t we work here?'” the businessman said. “Instead of apologizing, they threatened us of dire consequences if we did not leave Himachal Pradesh. He also accused us of being anti-national and supporters of terrorism.
Every winter thousands of Kashmiris travel to different Indian states to sell handmade goods like shawls, suits and leather jackets door-to-door or street-to-street. They say they sometimes face difficulties – including verbal abuse, physical attacks and calls for boycott – because of their regional identity and rising communal tensions in India.
Traders say such incidents were rare before 2014, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party came to power.
“Before 2014, only a mad person would make such statements or resort to violence, but today it has become common,” leather jacket seller Pirzada Mohammed Shafi Shah told VOA from Salt Lake City, West Bengal.
“Muslims, especially Kashmiris, are seen as the enemy in almost every part of India. There are three to four states where communalism is so high that most Kashmiris have stopped going there,” Shah said. “If the Jammu and Kashmir government or the Jammu and Kashmir government had acted initially, things could have been much better.”
Traders in Himachal Pradesh claimed that people associated with Hindu extremist groups have threatened them and the owners of the buildings where they live, either individually or in groups.
“We are being warned that they are being polite now, and if we don’t comply, they will return,” another Kashmiri shawl seller told VOA on condition of anonymity out of fear for his safety. And their language will be different.”
“Apart from him, no one else has any problem with us. They give absurd reasons, like claiming that local shopkeepers in Himachal Pradesh face problems because of us, even though their way of working is completely different from ours,” he said.
Maqsood Khan, one of the traders, said that after the police complaint, the Deputy Superintendent of Ghumarwin Police Department met him. He said the police officer spoke to representatives of both the parties involved in the disagreement and directed the accused persons not to harass Kashmiri traders.
He said, “The Deputy Superintendent of Police told the opposition that like the local shopkeepers of the area, we too have the right to sell our products.” “This has temporarily subsided,” but the situation “will be resolved only when representatives of both sides express each other’s concerns.” [the] Deputy Commissioner.” Meanwhile, Ifra Jaan, spokeswoman for Jammu and Kashmir’s ruling party National Conference, told VOA over the phone that the lives and safety of Kashmiri traders across India are important to her party.
Jaan said, “When we came to know about the harassment case, when these people were abused, abused and threatened, Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah immediately contacted Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister. ” “The Himachal Pradesh government has now taken cognizance of the matter, and their office is ensuring a safe environment for Kashmiri traders and students living there.”
VOA contacted the Ghumarwin Police Department about the latest developments on the situation, however officials there said only higher-ups can speak about the matter, and they were not available for comment.
Earlier in November, a woman official of a panchayat, a local self-government body in Indian villages, had asked Kashmiri shawl sellers not to do business in Himachal Pradesh. In one video, he asked them to leave the village and raised slogans of “Lord Ram ki Jai”, one of the gods revered in Hinduism. He later apologized for those comments after being called to the Himachal Pradesh police station.
“We want to end this unwanted dispute and live happily and peacefully [our] Hindu brothers in the state, said the mine trader. “We urge the governments of both regions to take the necessary steps” and take steps to end the harassment, “to address this issue once and for all.”