I Still Can’t Breathe: A Sentence for Ending Racism in US but Never Heard from Occupied Kashmir.I still can’t breathe has become a sigh of ending racism in USA and around the world. ‘’I can’t breathe’’ was the last sentence spoken by George Floyd, a black American in police custody asking for relief and died due the violent behaviour of US police.
His death sparked a revolution in the USA and western world against racism and hashtags of black blood matters are the leading trends of the world but hundreds and thousands of Kashmiri’s have lost their lives on the same issues and world has not listen even a single cry.
The most important question is how racism is seen in the United States, but racism against the oppressed people of occupied Kashmir has never been seen by the world? Why nobody is trending the hashtags of Kashmiri’s blood also matters.
Racism is a form of discrimination based on differences in appearance as well as cultural differences in language, customs, religion, history, and etc. Perhaps the clearest example of racism is that whites are superior to blacks or Indian Hindus are superior over Kashmiri’s and Indian’s Muslims etc.
This is the kind of racism that has led to widespread protests in the USA and Western world in recent days following the killing of George Floyd, an African American by US police.
George Floyd is a black American man who died on May 25, 2020, after a U.S. police officer put his knee on his neck for about nine minutes. The hashtag “I can’t breathe” and “I still can’t breathe” are the main slogans of American protesters again racism.
After this incident, passers-by recorded the incident with a mobile camera and spread it widely on social networks. The painful moment in the film is when George, trying to breathe, tells the white police, “I can’t breathe.” After George’s death, his painful sentence, “I can’t breathe,” became a major hashtag for protests on social media in the United States and around the world.
In addition, widespread street protests across the United States and elsewhere against racism have begun and continue.
“I Can’t Breathe” is the everyday story of Indian occupied Kashmir’s Muslims for last 70+ years and more than 1 million Indian military deployed in Kashmir, is not to let the Kashmiri Muslims to breathe in fact. But the sad thing is that this happens not once every few years, but every day in Indian occupied Kashmir and this bitter story remains hidden from the eyes of whole world.
In the past three days (the world mourned George’s assassination) while Indian Army soldiers have killed 18 Kashmiri youths in just 72 hours after besieging a large area in Kashmir.
Occupied Kashmir is the name of the land where Muslims are most insulted and oppressed by the Indian military, and men and women, young and old, are severely harmed. But no one is shouting “I can’t breathe” for these Muslims whose only crime is struggling for their identity.
Pakistan’s prime minister has repeatedly warned of India’s plan to purge Muslims of the Jammu and Kashmir region. Unfortunately, the Indian government’s military rule in occupied Kashmir is such that the Internet and all social networks are completely cut off. In a way, we can’t even see the film about the oppression of this religious racism.
If today all the communities of world have been shouted “No to racism”, isn’t it time for us as Muslims to hear the voice of the oppressed Muslims of Kashmir? Or Isn’t it time to use hashtag Kashmir is not alone? Or hashtag, Kashmiris Blood also matters?
Original published in Daily Balochistan Times (BTimes) by
Dr. Muahmmad Irfan-maqsood, Ph.D.
MSc (BioTech), PhD (BioTech), MA (Pol Sci)