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Opinion National Interest PoV 50-Word Edit

ThePrint On Camera Videos In Pictures

Society & Culture Around Town Book Excerpts Vigyapanti The Dating Story

More Judiciary Education YourTurn Work With Us Campus Voice

PoK unrest is a 1971 moment for Pakistan. It’s a strategic opportunity for India

New Delhi should closely monitor the situation. Several actions can be initiated to reach out to the people of PoK, who are no less Indians than Indian citizens.

The 1971 Bangladesh Liberation War moment has come back to haunt Pakistan. This time, it’s closer to Islamabad, on its northwestern border in the illegally occupied areas of Kashmir or Pakistan-occupied Kashmir. 

In a violent reaction to protests spearheaded by the Jammu Kashmir Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC), the Pakistani Rangers and police cracked down on the protestors, resulting in dozens of deaths in police firing and several injuries. Founded in 2023, the JAAC organised protests demanding subsidised flour and lower electricity tariffs. 

The logic was to plough back to the locals, the revenue earned by the government through power generated by the multipurpose Mangla Dam—the seventh-largest in the world—situated on the Jhelum River in Pakistan, lying in the Mirpur District of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (POK) and the Jhelum District of Punjab.

What began as a demand for daily needs and electricity escalated into mass demonstrations across major towns in PoK. A highly rattled Islamabad deployed heavily armed police to quell the protests. JAAC, which led the protests, came up with a 38-point Charter of Demands and began negotiations with the government, but it was very unwisely banned last week.

The immediate cause of the present protests, which led to a major law and order breakdown and administrative crisis, stems from a heady mix of........

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