NEW DELHI: Indian authorities imposed security restrictions in Ladakh on Thursday, following deadly clashes between police and protesters demanding greater autonomy for the Himalayan region which borders China.
Protests turned violent on Wednesday after demonstrators threw stones at officers trying to disperse them in Leh, Ladakh’s main city, where they torched the regional office of India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party.
The Ministry of Home Affairs confirmed in a statement that the police had fired on the protesters — whom they referred to as a “mob” — and “unfortunately some casualties are reported.”
It said that more than 30 police personnel had been injured, while twice as many protesters were reported by protest organizers to have been wounded.
Following the incidents, restrictions were imposed in Ladakh’s main districts, Leh and Kargil, with markets closed and police and paramilitary troops patrolling the streets.
“The situation is under control, but it is still tense. In Leh there is a curfew in some parts. In Kargil, they have imposed Section 144 — a ban on the assembly of more than four people,” said Sajjad Kargili, member of the Kargil Democratic Alliance and the Leh Apex Body, the political advocacy groups central to the region’s negotiations with the Indian government.
Ladakh is part of greater Kashmiri territory, which has for decades been disputed by India, Pakistan and China.
Ladakh’s Muslim-majority Kargil district was the site of military conflict between India and Pakistan in 1999, while the Buddhist-majority Leh district is where India’s deadly border clashes with China in 2020 led to the freezing of relations for five years.
The region belonged to the Indian-controlled semi-autonomous Jammu and Kashmir state until 2019, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government abolished its statehood and put it under the direct administration of New Delhi.
More than 90 percent of the 230,000 population is listed by the Indian government as Scheduled Tribes — a category which includes tribal and Indigenous communities entitled to land protections.
The local community has been peacefully protesting over the past six years. Led by climate activist Sonam Wangchuk, it has been seeking special status for Ladakh to allow the setting up of elected local bodies to have autonomy over the region’s land and agriculture.
“For the last six years, there have been no jobs, no democracy. The government made promises about implementing the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution that provides greater administrative autonomy and self-governance of tribal areas … Even the BJP has promised that,” Kargili told Arab News.
“We don’t have any public service commission. The youth don’t have any jobs. This is the reason for the frustration. People are very upset and frustrated because no one is listening.”
Protesters in Leh city have been on hunger strike for the past 15 days. While a round of talks with the government was scheduled for Oct. 6, Wednesday’s clashes erupted when two elderly strikers collapsed and had to be hospitalized.
“Four youths died in the clash,” Rigzin Wangmo, a Ladakh-based journalist who was at the site, told Arab News.
“We have never seen anything like this before. It was just a normal protest and a peaceful protest followed by a rally. Suddenly, the crowd was not in control, and nobody expected that, not even the police.”
