Are Militants in Jammu and Kashmir Shifting the Battleground to Forests?

A 12-day faceoff between Indian security forces and militants in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) has underscored yet again the continuing capacity of the latter to engage the armed forces – and even survive – in prolonged military face-offs.

A joint team of the J&K Police, Indian Army soldiers, and central paramilitary troopers initiated a counterinsurgency operation in the Akhal forest in south Kashmir’s Kulgam district on August 1. The operation was based on specific intelligence inputs about the presence of militants deep in the forest. Drones and helicopters were used to surveil the area, and paracommandos and sniffer dogs were deployed.

Yet, militants were able to not only hold out against the security forces for 12 days – the Kulgam encounter was among the longest in J&K in several decades – but also inflict heavy losses on them. Two soldiers were killed and 10 others were injured. There was just one militant fatality in the encounter.

With the other militants holed up in the Akhal forest reportedly slipping out of the security cordon and melting into the surrounding mountains, security forces called off the operation on August 12.

The prolonged encounter at Kulgam is not an isolated incident. It was preceded by a string of similar faceoffs in the forested belts of Kathua, Doda, Reasi, Rajouri, and Poonch districts in the Jammu region.

The incidents have set alarm bells ringing in India’s security establishment. Have militants shifted their battleground to J&K’s forests?

J&K Police sources say that militants have become “increasingly accustomed to fighting government forces in multi-day operations in the densely forested and rugged mountains of J&K.” If in the past militants sheltered in safe houses in J&K’s towns, post-2019, they have moved to forested areas.

“They are shifting the battleground to the forests,” a senior police officer in the J&K Police Force told The Diplomat.

Only three months ago, militants scored a major victory when they carried out an attack at Pahalgam in the Kashmir Valley that left 26 people, all unarmed civilian men, dead. The attack exposed the myth propagated by the Narendra Modi government that life in the Kashmir Valley had “normalized” in recent years and that the militancy in Kashmir was on its last legs.

Following its revocation of J&K’s autonomy in August 2019, the Modi government cracked down on political and militant separatists. The hawala network that funds separatist activity was weakened. Counterinsurgency operations were stepped up. The situation in Kashmir, the Modi government claimed, had normalized.

Indeed, stone pelting, mass protests, and shutdowns, which were a staple of daily life in Kashmir, have become a thing of the past. The crackdowns dismantled the network of “safe houses” for militants in J&K’s towns and villages. According to South Asia Terrorism Portal figures, the total number of fatalities in militancy-related incidents in J&K dropped from 321 in 2020 to 127 in 2024.

However, civilians were far from safe from militant violence. According to a report in The Hindu, civilian fatalities in militant attacks in 2024 were the highest since 2005. This year’s civilian fatalities are likely to be even higher than last year’s peak, given the large number of such deaths in a single incident – the terrorist attack at Pahalgam in April this year.

Under pressure from counterinsurgency operations in the Kashmir region, militants sought to divert the security forces’ attention by carrying out attacks in the Jammu region, which has been relatively free from militancy over the last couple of decades. However, figures indicate that while attacks in Jammu, including major ambushes and encounters with security forces and attacks on civilians, increased, militants did not shift the focus of their attacks away from Kashmir. Rather, they extended their focus into the hitherto quiet Jammu region.

The number of militancy-related incidents in Kashmir, as well as deaths of security forces, civilians, and militants, was far higher in the Kashmir region, according to a report in The Hindu. Consider this: Between 2021 and mid-2024, the number of militancy-related incidents in Kashmir was 263 compared to 31 in Jammu. The number of fatalities of security forces, civilians and militants in Kashmir was 68, 75, and 417, respectively. Comparable figures in Jammu were 47, 19 and 48.

The J&K police officer told The Diplomat that the number of militants active in J&K has fallen “drastically” in recent years. “Foreign militants are dominating the scene. Their numbers are in double digits, compared to local militants whose numbers are in single digits,” he claimed, adding that militants of Lashkar-e-Taiba and its affiliate The Resistance Front, and Jaish-e-Mohammed and its affiliate, the People’s Anti-Fascist Front, are “most numerous” in J&K. These are Pakistan-based groups and their members are largely Pakistani-Punjabi.

As for the Hizbul Mujahideen, a predominantly Kashmiri group that once accounted for the bulk of the militants active in J&K, it is “a shadow of its former self,” the police officer said.

Post-2019, India’s smashing of separatists and their support networks in J&K did have an impact on militancy. It weakened the local component of the militant groups. Deprived of safe houses and support systems in J&K’s villages and towns, foreign militants – those being pushed into India from Pakistan – have sheltered in mountains and forests. They are well-armed and trained in Pakistan and able to hide in forests in J&K. This explains their capacity to survive counterinsurgency operations over long periods, the police officer said.