India

Kashmiris suffer from selective dementia, says Top Indian Army General

Photo: WikiMedia.

Srinagar: Amid the killings of non-locals in Kashmir, former GOC 15 Corps and Director General of Defence Intelligence Agency and Deputy Chief of Integrated Defence Staff, Lt General K J S Dhillon has accused Kashmiris of “selective dementia”

Speaking during a webinar, Dhillon wondered whether the word “Kashmiri” runs the risk of being treated as a pejorative similar to “Paki” if they do not condemn the killings of non-Muslims in the valley, the report said.

The general said, “We are a democratic country where we have a right to dissent, to express our feelings. We have the right to (have our own) feelings but whenever there is a killing by terrorists, selective dementia happens.”

Lt Gen Dhillon said “Paki” (Pakistani) was an abuse in the West, and he asked Kashmiris whether they wanted to become “a society like that”.

“Where you are called a name… but it is an abuse. Are we heading that way? Do we need to go that way? We have a 5000-year-plus rich history, which is peaceful co-existence, Kashmiriyat, insaniyat (humanity) and Sufiyat (Sufism),” he said.

Lt Gen Dhillon said 66 per cent of the population of Kashmir was below 32 years of age and they could be referred to as “children of conflict”. He said there was a need to “understand their psychology”.

“They were born and brought up during the gun culture, strikes, curfews and crackdowns. They have grown up with a scar on their psychology. They have grown through radicalization and propaganda,” the officer was quoted by The Telegraph as saying.

 

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