Kashmir

When the Pakistani authorities arrested Joint Awami Action Committee (JAAC) core member Shaukat Nawaz Mir, they expected to break the momentum of a movement that had already endured weeks of repression, arrests and political intimidation. The calculation was familiar: remove the leadership, criminalise the organisation, isolate the movement through an information blackout and gradually exhaust the population through fear and economic hardship. Similar methods have been employed against democratic movements across Pakistan for decades. Yet in Pakistan-administered Jammu Kashmir, the strategy produced an outcome very different from that intended by the state. Rather than retreating, the movement entered a new political phase.