CNN-News18 has accessed explosive details of Kashmir Media Service (KMS) News, a Pakistan-based online propaganda news portal, which has been proactively uploading anti-India and ‘pro-separatism’ content since its inception.
This news portal (https://www.kmsnews.org) is purely dedicated to what they call the ‘Freedom Movement’ of Kashmir. The portal vehemently presents Pakistanis’ and separatists’ perspective of Kashmir and serves as a mouthpiece for the separatist camp. This online portal highlights every small to large anti-India incident and provides a platform to carry forward their agenda against India, according to top intelligence sources.
KMS News presents falsified and distorted facts, analysis and self-compiled fabricated researches on issues pertaining to Kashmir. The main motive of this Pakistan-based news portal is to mislead the international community and defame the government of Jammu and Kashmir to boost the presence, influence and relevance of the separatist camp and terror outfits and to project separatists as true representatives of the people of Kashmir, said sources.
The portal hosts ‘Radio Sada-e-Hurriyat’ on its website, which is also a propaganda peddling medium against India. The website also maintains a data of alleged human rights (HR) violations (in picture, above) since 1989 in the valley, as well as year-wise list of such violations allegedly due to state action. It also reproduces various media reports from international journals, HR reports and Turkish media, and, of late, news reports critical of the Government of India from some of the Indian publications.
The KMS group, also runs Kashmir Insight, a 32-page monthly magazine, which is available on Scribd.com and is full of propaganda reports against India. The column brings out the alleged HR violations in the valley each month with a list of incidents and other details. The last publication was in February 2020. The portal has been restricted for Indian IPs since April 2021.
THE PEOPLE INVOLVED: ACCORDING TO INTEL SOURCES
- Raies Mir: Originally from Sopore area of Baramulla District, Mir is presently in Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (PoK) and works as the associate editor of the KMS. He did his Masters at Aligarh Muslim University (AMU). Mir contributes to Human Rights column of the magazine ‘Kashmir Insight’ published by the KMS, wherein he presents “facts and figures" regarding the alleged human rights violations. The monthly propaganda magazine is being published by the All Parties Hurriyat Conference PoJK, Rawalpindi, with Mohd Raza Malik as its editor. A majority of the content on his social media profiles is from KMS News. There is not much information about him on open source. Some of his social media are withheld in India.
- Sheikh Tajamul Islam: A patron of the portal, Islam was a Kashmiri separatist who migrated/infiltrated to Pakistan during the 1990s and settled there. He was a leader of the student wing of the JeI, Islami Jamait-ul-Tulba and was known for his student activism during the late 1980s. After migration to Pakistan, Islam worked with the news section of PTV from 1998 to 1999. He headed the Institute of Kashmir Affairs from 1992 to 2000. Later, he joined the Kashmir Media Service as the Executive Director in 1999 and remained associated with it till his death in Pakistan in September 2021. He was also the Chief Editor of Kashmir Insight magazine.
- Mohd Raza Malik is the chief editor. Arif Hussain, a resident of Mardan city of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, is the editor.
SUPPORTING SEPARATISTS
The portal has been using terms such as ‘Indian state terrorism in IIOJK’, ‘Indian brutal tactics’, ‘just struggle of Kashmiris’, ‘right to self-determination’, etc. to paint the Indian state as a ‘colonial’ power and present India in bad light. The portal is continuously putting out ‘self-published’ statements of separatist leaders, when most of them are in jail and have no access to media. This is done to keep separatist leaders relevant and present them as “real" leaders of Jammu and Kashmir, said sources.
The portal, in its articles and reportage, has been openly brandishing J&K mainstream politicians as ‘Kashmiri puppets’, giving a notion that they are not the true representatives of the people of Jammu and Kashmir.
The portal has extensive write-ups on alleged ‘demographic change in Jammu and Kashmir.’ In its articles published on the website, it claims that India has so far issued over 3.4 million ‘fake’ domicile certificates to non-Kashmiris, reiterating the Pakistani stand that New Delhi is trying to change the demography of J&K, said sources.
Besides, the portal has alleged the Indian government of imposing ‘Hindutva’ agenda, saying that the Kashmiris would never allow Modi’s ‘Hindutva’ regime to artificially engineer the Muslim-majority Kashmir into a Muslim-minority territory by bringing in demographic changes in Jammu and Kashmir, said sources.
In one of the reports published on October 7, 2021 it said that India’s alleged illegal actions, had endangered all spheres of human security in Jammu & Kashmir, yet New Delhi could not stop resolute Kashmiris’ march towards freedom from Indian clutches, said sources.
MINORITY ISSUES
The portal has been continuously raking up minority related issues claiming that Indian minorities are facing an existential threat under the PM Narendra Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) rule since 2014. Its reports mention that the Modi government, backed by right-wing Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, is imposing Hindutva ideology in India and is hell bent on converting the country into a Hindu Rashtra, said sources.
Through propaganda reporting and selective narrative, it further alleged that forcible conversion, attack on mosques and churches and lynching of Muslims by Hindu fanatics have become a norm in Modi’s India, said sources.
For the past several years, the portal has been proactively carrying statements from detained separatist Massarat Alam as well as Mirwaiz Umar Farooq. As per the portal, Alam issues shutdown calls from Tihar Jail, urging people to observe complete shutdown in view many events such as the Hyderpora encounter, Rambagh encounter, Republic Day, etc.
Of late, the portal has also published statements of mainstream political leaders from J&K, which are critical to the Indian government or local administration, said sources.
The portal is extensively writing on the Delimitation Commission, alleging that the Indian government is engaged in pre-poll rigging to install a Hindu chief minister in the territory, said sources.
The portal has been instrumental in setting and furthering the toxic agenda of secessionist forces as well as proscribed armed outfits by identifying their potential targets, vilifying and labeling them as collaborators and subsequently laying a ground for deadly attacks.
The portal has been fostering hate campaign in Jammu and Kashmir, pinpointing and vilifying rational forces, radicalizing young impressionable minds and subsequently patronizing political killings in the valley. It is an established fact that the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), the deep state, in one or the other form have been fomenting trouble in the valley and the portal seems to be yet another ploy by Pakistan and its deep state agencies to induce more commotion and vehemence in the valley, said sources.
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