The Centre has launched an assault on one of Kashmir’s pre-Partition symbols of resistance against the Hindu Dogra rulers, disowning the Muslim “martyrs” who gave up their lives fighting their tyranny.

Lieutenant governor G.C. Murmu’s administration has struck down July 13 and December 5 from the list of public holidays for the newly created Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir.

July 13 was observed for decades as “Martyrs’ Day” in memory of the men killed by the Dogras’ forces in 1931 to crush protests against their rule.

December 5 is the birth anniversary of National Conference founder Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah, who played a key role in Jammu and Kashmir’s accession to India and whose grave is, for this reason, guarded round the clock against any vandalism by anti-India protesters.

Added to the list of public holidays will now be October 26, the day Jammu and Kashmir acceded to India in 1947. It will be observed as “Accession Day”.

The government has not made any changes to the other holidays, which include Muslim and Hindu festivals.

The July 13 martyrs were considered “everybody’s martyrs” in the Valley, deemed so not just by the pro-azadi brigade but also by national parties like the Congress and the CPM. The Valley would traditionally observe a shutdown in their memory.

Some Kashmiri Pandit and Dogra groups have of late been observing July 13 as a “black day”, calling the martyrs “miscreants” who allegedly targeted the minorities back then.

“It appears that my grandfather has been martyred afresh. Those people were unarmed peaceful protesters who fought the Dogras’ tyranny,” National Conference activist Mir Ghulam Mohammad Saqi, whose grandfather Khazir Mohammad Mir was killed by Dogra forces in 1931, told The Telegraph.

“That struggle was not against any religion; it was a struggle by victims, who mostly happened to be Muslim, against their rulers who happened to be Hindus. Kashmiri Muslims were treated worse than cattle. We had no rights, were taken on begar (forced labour), had no right over our lands. The punishment for killing a cow was death.”

Saqi said the government’s latest decision confirmed that it saw the Dogra rulers as its own because they were Hindu, and considered those who fought them as troublemakers because they were Muslim.

He said the then Congress leadership had supported the people’s struggle against the Dogra rulers.

Saqi’s grandfather was not among the 22 men killed on July 13, 1931, but among others who were killed in the following weeks and months. The day is a milestone in Kashmir’s independence struggle, which is considered to have begun formally that day.

BJP spokesperson Anil Gupta justified the decision on public holidays and denied there was any communal angle to it. “July 13 had never had state-wide acceptance (as Martyrs’ Day). It was Valley-centric. They (those killed) were heroes for some and rioters for others. It was the first day in Kashmir’s history when there were communal riots,” he said.

Gupta said there was no reason to have a public holiday on the birth anniversary of one particular chief minister (Sheikh Abdullah).

National Conference MP Hasnain Masoodi said the decision would not remove the reverence for such occasions from the people’s hearts. “But it has certainly hurt people.”