The annual Kashmir Solidarity Day on February 5th is a case study in strategic propaganda that has nothing to do with the reality of governance. What began as a domestic political gimmick by Nawaz Sharif in 1991 has evolved into a tool of state militarism, exploited by the military-intelligence establishment of Pakistan to conceal its neglect of the illegally occupied territories under its control in favor of projecting its fabricated solidarity with the international community. The hypocrisy is palpable–every year on February 5th, Pakistan marks “Kashmir freedom” through massive rallies and statements even as the people of Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (PoJK) hold counter-protests demanding freedom from Islamabad’s repressive rule.
*The Anatomy of a Political Commodity*
The Kashmir Solidarity Day was not a spontaneous outgrowth of grassroots nationalism. It was conceptualised by Qazi Hussain Ahmed of Jamaat-e-Islami in 1990. Still, Nawaz Sharif later exploited it in 1991 as a “Kashmir Solidarity Day Strike,” which was a deliberate attempt to consolidate his political support among Islamist partners in his coalition government who had helped him ascend to power. The 1991 strike was, in fact, Sharif’s “thank you” to his political supporters, a shallow gesture lacking any strategic depth. This political token was later formalised by the Pakistani government in 2004 when the Ministry for Kashmir Affairs declared February 5 a national holiday, turning Sharif’s shallow gesture into a state apparatus.
*Military Appropriation and the ISI Weaponisation*
The process of transformation from a political symbol to a military tool was hastened by the strategic shift in Pakistan’s proxy war policy. Functioning since 1988 under the umbrella of Operation Tupac, the ISI of Pakistan had established a complex network of terrorist proxies, Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammed, Hizbul Mujahideen to conduct a covert war against India without ever having to worry about the repercussions of conventional warfare. Kashmir Solidarity Day had become the sine qua non of this proxy network, offering ideological validation, recruitment drive momentum, and international propaganda fodder. By the 2020s, the day had become fully militarised.
*PoJ&K’s Unraveling: The Inconvenient Truth*
The same February 5 that Pakistan celebrates produces a reflexive crisis within territories it actually controls. In 2024, the Joint Awami Action Committee of PoJK announced a deliberate counter-narrative, rebranding February 5 as “People’s Rights Day” and organizing a region-wide shutdown to demand constitutional inclusion, subsidized wheat, and judicial independence. This was not dissent from enemy territory but protest from within Pakistan’s own frontiers—an indictment of governance so severe that it could not be ignored or dismissed as Indian propaganda.
The economic grievances that are the cause of these protests are catastrophic. Rising education costs have emerged as a grievance in PoJK, though fee levels vary widely by institution and programme, making broad claims of uniform semester costs inaccurate without institution-specific data. The healthcare system has been completely privatised, and the private hospitals are taking advantage of patients in a system that has no effective public healthcare option. The subsidy on electricity has been stopped in PoJK despite the region’s severe energy poverty, leading to protests that forced the government to make temporary concessions but no lasting change. The unemployment rate remains at a crisis level, with youth suicides in Gilgit-Baltistan’s Ghizer district alone at 300 since 2000, a demographic disaster that got scant attention during the February 5th events.
The manner in which the Pakistani government handled the protests in PoJK is indicative of the militaristic tendencies. Markets were forced to shut down, communication blackouts were enforced, key activists were arrested and when these measures failed, the Pakistan Army was brought in to quell the civilian unrest. This was not the action of a state respecting the wishes of its people but that of an occupying military force crushing the demands for good governance.
*J&K’s Transformation: The Alternative Reality*
The contrast with Indian-administered J&K’s post-2019 trajectory renders Pakistan’s Solidarity Day discourse grotesque. Following the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019, Jammu and Kashmir has undergone a comprehensive transformation in infrastructure and the economy. Domestic tourist arrivals surged from 25.19 lakh in 2020 to 2.35 crore in 2024–a ninefold increase. Foreign tourist arrivals, albeit smaller in absolute terms, recovered from 1,650 in 2021 to 65,452 in 2024, reflecting restored confidence in the region’s stability.
Infrastructure investment exceeding Rs25,000 crore has produced 2,200+ development projects, including the strategically vital Zojila Tunnel and expanded national highways. Post-2019 investment stands at Rs 9,606 crore, generating 1,984 industrial units and 63,710 jobs, tangible employment creation rather than the unemployment crises afflicting PoJK. Official figures indicate that local militant recruitment in Jammu and Kashmir declined by over 94 percent since 2021, with recruitment falling to single-digit levels by 2024. Terrorist-initiated incidents in Jammu and Kashmir fell sharply from 228 in 2018 to 44 in 2023, according to data cited by India’s Ministry of Home Affairs.
February 5 endures as Pakistan’s annual contradiction made visible. Military uniforms parade through PoJK cities while its residents stage simultaneous protests demanding real rights. Terror group leaders deliver speeches about ‘liberated Kashmir’ in territories that brutally suppress domestic dissent. Government officials celebrate ‘solidarity’ with populations whose universities, hospitals and livelihoods they have systematically starved of investment. Meanwhile, in Jammu and Kashmir, governance improvements and economic integration proceed methodically, offering its people what PoJK cannot–functional administration, economic opportunity and the prospect of normalcy.
Kashmir Solidarity Day has evolved from Sharif’s cynical political theatre to the ISI’s instrument of militarism, obscuring a governance failure so profound that Pakistan must suppress its own population to prevent exposure. The day’s observance is less a testament to solidarity than an admission of irreversible decline, an annual, ceremonial disavowal of responsibility disguised as patriotism.
