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03-05-2025
ISLAMABAD/ MUZAFFARABAD: The government of Pakistan-administered Kashmir has closed all religious seminaries in the region for 10 days, officials said yesterday, citing fears they would be targeted by Indian strikes following a deadly attack on tourists in Indian Kashmir.
Islamabad says it has credible intelligence that India intends to launch military action soon, with New Delhi alleging that the attack on tourists was carried out by Pakistani nationals with ties to Islamist organizations based there.
The director of Pakistani Kashmir’s Department of Religious Affairs, Hafiz Nazir Ahmad, told media that security officials feared Indian forces may target seminaries and label them as militant training centres.
The notification seen by Reuters, dated April 30, only cited a heatwave as the reason for the closure. “Right now, we are facing two kinds of heat one from the weather and the other from (Indian Prime Minister) Modi,” Ahmad said of the notification, saying they did not mention the risk of attacks in a bid to avoid panic.
India’s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment. India has previously targeted sites in Pakistan alleging they were bases of Islamist militants close to the Kashmir border.
“We held a meeting yesterday in which it was unanimously decided not to put innocent children at risk,” Ahmad said. The President’s Office of Pakistani Kashmir also said the closure was due to “precautionary reasons.”
There are 445 registered seminaries with over 26,000 students enrolled in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. The seminaries, locally known as madrasas are Islamic educational institutions run by religious organizations, providing cheap, often free, alternatives to regular schools. Pakistan has said it will respond “assuredly and decisively” to any military action from India, raising the spectre of war between the two nuclear-armed countries. Kashmir, a Muslim-majority Himalayan region, is claimed in full, but ruled in parts by both India and Pakistan, and has been the site of two wars and multiple skirmishes.
Many Muslims in Indian Kashmir have long resented what they see as heavy-handed rule by India. In 1989, an insurgency by Muslim separatists began. India poured troops into the region and tens of thousands of people have been killed.
India accuses Pakistan of arming and training militants, which Islamabad denies, saying it offers only moral and diplomatic support. Seminaries have been criticized for radicalizing youth towards Islamist extremism.
Pakistan said on Wednesday it has “credible intelligence” that India intends to launch military action soon, as tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbors escalate following a deadly attack on tourists in Indian Kashmir.
Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif urged the US to press India to “dial down the rhetoric and act responsibly.”
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has asked both nations to “de-escalate tensions,” a State Department spokesperson said in a statement on Wednesday.
In the April 22 attack, the Islamist assailants segregated men, asked their names and targeted Hindus before shooting them at close range in the Pahalgam area, killing 26 people, officials and survivors said. India has identified the three attackers, including two Pakistani nationals, as “terrorists” waging a violent revolt in Muslim-majority Kashmir. Islamabad has denied any role and called for a neutral investigation.
Hindu-majority India accuses Islamic Pakistan of funding and encouraging militancy in Kashmir, a Himalayan territory claimed by both nations but ruled in part by them. Islamabad says it only provides moral and diplomatic support to a Kashmiri demand for self-determination. (Int’l News Desk)
