Last October, nearly two dozen members of the European Parliament were taken on an all-expenses-paid trip to the Indian-administered side of the disputed region of Kashmir. It was the first time foreign nationals had been allowed into Jammu and Kashmir since Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government stripped India’s only Muslim-majority state of the special status it had enjoyed for more than 70 years, two months earlier. 

After winning a second term in office in April 2019, Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party-led administration moved fast to consolidate its Hindu nationalist agenda. On August 5, the government abrogated Article 370 of India’s constitution, which gave Kashmir the ability to formulate its own laws on all matters but defense, communications and foreign affairs. 

While this legal maneuver was executed, Kashmir was locked down tight. Overnight, hundreds of political leaders were placed under house arrest. Landline, cellphone and internet connections were severed. Businesses ground to a halt, shops were shuttered and schools closed. The most militarized zone on the planet turned into a prison, filled with seven million people.

At the same time, the Indian government blocked the entry of outsiders to the state. On October 3, U.S. Senator Chris van Hollen’s request to visit Srinagar – Kashmir’s largest city – as part of a delegation to observe conditions there was declined. Foreign correspondents were also barred, leaving much of the international media’s reporting to be done by local journalists, who put their stories on USB sticks and gave them to those leaving Kashmir. Even leaders of India’s opposition parties were denied entry.