NIA Probe and the Collapse of the ‘Local Support’ Theory in Pahalgam Probe

The attack had created a 'permissive atmosphere' in which Kashmiris found themselves as targets, reports Shakir Mir.

Over two months after the Pahalgam terror attack, the latest update from NIA appears to have thrown a spanner into the narrative of “local complicity” which had led to "bulldozer justice" in Kashmir.

(Photo: Kamran Akhter/The Quint)

When the group of armed assailants stormed through the picturesque Baisaran meadow in Pahalgam on 22 April, perpetrating one of the worst terrorist attacks in Jammu & Kashmir in two decades, 35-year-old Ishfaq Ganai (name changed), a Kashmiri employee at a private firm in Pune, immediately grew apprehensive about the safety of his family of three. 

“The killings were tragic, but my mind was also considering the possibility of hate attacks against Kashmiris living in different parts of the country,” Ganai told The Quint over phone from Pune. 

His fears came true when he read reports of alleged assault on Kashmiri students in Punjab two days after the terror attack. Many more attacks in other cities were to follow. Anticipating a threat, he sent his wife and child back to Kashmir even as he waited it out in Pune till he could avail his leaves, which were scheduled for Eid in early June.

The “negative” coverage about Kashmiris on TV news channels—based on the narrative of the alleged local involvement in the Pahalgam attack—whipped up a frenzy of hate, resulting in the reprisal attacks against them. One estimate by the Association of Protection of Civil Rights noted there were 184 hate crimes targeting Muslims and Kashmiris across different parts of India between 22 April to 8 May.

However, two months after the Pahalgam attack, the latest update from National Investigation Agency (NIA) on the ongoing probe appears to have thrown a spanner into the narrative of “local complicity”.

NIA’s Arrests Shift the Focus to Foreign Militants

Last week, the NIA announced it had arrested two Pahalgam residents, Parvaiz Ahmad Jothar and Bashir Ahmad Jothar, for sheltering the terrorists involved in the 22 April carnage.

The agency also revealed that the three perpetrators were not Kashmiris as previously thought, but Pakistani nationals associated with the Lashkar-e-Toiba terrorist group. 

“Parvaiz and Bashir had knowingly harboured the three armed terrorists at a seasonal dhok (hut) at Hill Park before the attack. The two men had provided food, shelter, and logistical support to the terrorists, who had, on the fateful afternoon, selectively killed the tourists on the basis of their religious identity, making it one of the most gruesome terrorist attacks ever.”

NIA spokesperson

Right after the attack in April, the local authorities in J&K had released a sketch of the suspected assailants.

One of them was recognised as Aadil Thoker, a man with a scraggly beard, his hair neatly parted in the middle. Police identified him as a local militant from Guri village in Kashmir’s Anantnag district.

The Quint had visited his house in Guri in May, where his mother, Shahzada, said the authorities must bring her son to justice if he was indeed involved in the killings.

“I haven’t seen him for seven years now,” she had said. 

The second man in the sketch had a smattering of white goatee and appeared to have slung a military bandolier across his shoulder. He was identified as Musa, a Pakistani national. The third sketch showed a young man carrying a backpack, his face edged with a thin strip of beard. The police release identified him as Asif Sheikh, a local militant from Awantipora village. 

Investigators Grapple with Evolving Leads

Ganai, the Kashmiri employee, recalls how some TV channels spun the case of Muzamil Kumhar, the zipline operator in Baisaran who was hounded for uttering ‘Allah-hu-Akbar’ as the gunfire rang out in the backdrop while he was pushing Rishi Bhatt, a Gujarati tourist, along the zipline. The video was shot by Bhatt as he was cruising from one point to another.

“The tourist first appeared on a primetime debate on a news channel,” Ganai recalls. “He didn’t say much about the local involvement that time. But in the next round, he was hosted on a popular news podcast, where the anchor was trying to goad him into implicating locals.”

The NIA interrogated Kumhar on the suspicion of his involvement in the attack. But he was later released, with the NIA reportedly concluding that the chanting during the time of the attack was his “natural reaction to something shocking or sudden."

Amid the narrative of local involvement in the attack came the demolition of at least nine houses associated with the active local militants. Shortly before the demolitions, the NIA had released a list of 14 ‘active local terrorists’. As per The Quint's investigation, many of the demolished houses belonged to the names mentioned in the NIA list, including those of Aasif Sheikh and Aadil Thoker. 

Now, with the NIA’s new update, the nature of their involvement has become a subject of media speculation. A report in The Indian Express cited anonymous sources, saying that the “three men in the sketches are not the Pahalgam attackers.”

This also led to the Congress party accusing the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of a “major lapse in Pahalgam terror probe.” On 23 June, the NIA said in a press release that it took objection of a media report on the issue, although it did not mention which report.

The agency flagged the coverage as “speculative and misleading”, adding that the evidence the agency had gathered was still under the process of being analysed and had not yet reached the stage of conclusion. 

The Quint tried reaching out to NIA officials with questions pertaining to the status of investigation, but they did not respond. This story will be updated as and when they respond.

Alleged ‘Discrepancies’ in Investigation

The Quint also spoke to three senior local police sources familiar with insurgency in Kashmir, to understand why there were seemingly conflicting statements on the identity of the perpetrators in the Pahalgam case. 

“Not only in the case of Pahalgam, but even in previous big attacks such as the one carried out against security forces in Gadol village in Kokernag in September 2023, we had previously assumed that there was local involvement. But later, it turned out the assailants in that case, too, were FTs (foreign terrorists).”

A senior police source

Another officer said investigations are always an evolving process—and nothing is final until the chargesheet is filed. 

“The investigative agencies have interrogated close to 700 people in Pahalgam and visited almost all the dhoks. Obviously, as the information they have collected is analysed, new leads will emerge. This is not uncommon in Kashmir. It has happened previously,” the officer explained, citing the 2018 assassination of renowned editor Shujaat Bukhari.

“In Shujaat’s case, it was first believed that Pakistani terrorist Naveed Jutt was involved. But later, when investigations were concluded, we found that perpetrators were an entirely different group.”

There had also been large-scale detentions which appeared to feed into the narrative of local support. According to senior security sources, around 4,000 individuals were detained across various parts of Kashmir in the aftermath. However, 95 percent of them were also released within days.

Since 2019, the overt forms of local support of militancy have been continuously in decline. As per official data, local recruitment into the militancy in 2020 was 160. The figure came down to 125 locals in 2021, 130 in 2022, 23 in 2023, 20 in 2024, and ultimately to 14 as per the NIA’s list. In comparison, there are at least 59 foreign militants currently operating in J&K—four times the local participation. 

Decline in ‘Local Support’

During a brief period in 2021-2022, local support grew more secretive, leading security agencies to coin the term ‘hybrid terrorism’ to define the evolving security dynamics in Kashmir. During this time, young boys with no previous adverse record would participate in the killings of civilians or cops, and then walk away undetected from the scene of crime. 

At times, the local support from 'hybrid networks' would strengthen the militant designs. In early 2022, when Kashmir was grappling with a spate of assassinations of village committee heads, militants killed Shabir Ahmad Mir, a sarpanch (village head) in Awdoora village in Kulgam. They accused him of working with the Indian government.

His son Zahid Shabir explained to The Quint how his father had been sheltering at a government accommodation in Srinagar out of fear for his life in Awdoora. He had returned to Kulgam that particular day, only to collect his sarpanch card and his decision to stay overnight was made impromptu. Yet, militants managed to figure this out and the moment Shabir came out of his house in the evening, he was shot thrice in his abdomen. 

“Militants will never be able to access this pinpointed intelligence about their targets without the local support,” a security source explained. 

Another security source cited the raid on a terrorist hideout in Kulgam on 24 April this year to explain how local support was sometimes crucial for militants to operate. The visuals of the raid show the hideout was provisioned with food items, clothes, and cooking oil which, the sources said, “cannot be obtained without the local support.”

Yet, at the same time, the security sources maintained that in Pahalgam’s case, definitive evidence of local support is yet to emerge.

Permissive Atmosphere for Targeting

Independent security analysts added that prematurely releasing information about the investigations due to public pressure or due to consideration for political optics is bound to create such situations.

“There are always multiple lines of investigations that are pursued and only one of them will eventually prove to be correct. That’s why the authorities should not issue statements at a premature level."

Ajai Sahni, executive director, Institute of Conflict Management

As per experts, releasing information on the perpetrators in haste and reckless media coverage on Pahalgam attacks had created a “permissive atmosphere” that led to a situation in which Kashmiris found themselves as targets. 

“You have to be responsible when you are releasing a particular information or reporting on a particular issue, especially when it comes to a place like Kashmir,” explained Radha Kumar, who was appointed as one of the three interlocutors on J&K by the Cabinet Committee on Security in 2010. 

“Kashmiris have denounced the killings. Mirwaiz Umer Farooq mourned the Pahalgam victims at Jamia Masjid. Last year, there were elections and people voted in large numbers. This was the time where there should have been a political outreach. Instead of doing that, you are further hounding them," she said.

Meanwhile, the latest revelations have become mired into a political controversy in the Union Territory, with Chief Minister Omar Abdullah saying, “The biggest thing is that there was no local involvement. The gunmen who shot the 26 people were all foreigners,” adding that the two persons arrested for helping the attackers, “might have been coerced” into doing so.

(Shakir Mir is an independent journalist whose work delves into the intersection of conflict, politics, history and memory in J&K. He tweets at @shakirmir.)