Pulwama, Jammu & Kashmir: Inside a pesticide shop in Pulwama, in the centre of the Kashmir valley, Aarif Nazeer repeatedly disconnected phone calls while calculating unpaid dues.
“I am unable to even feed my family properly,” he said quietly. “After my father’s death, everything collapsed.”
Nazeer’s father, Nazeer Ahmad Wani, a naib tehsildar (deputy revenue officer in charge of a sub-district) in Pulwama, was dismissed from service in 2021 without a hearing under Article 311(2)(c) of the Constitution of India, which allows for the dismissal of a government employee without a hearing if deemed to be for the security of the state.
Wani’s dismissal followed the registration of an FIR (first information report) under the Unlawful Activities Prevention Act 1967 (UAPA), India’s counterterrorism law, after which he was jailed for two years in Srinagar's central jail.
Wani challenged the allegation that he was hiding militants in his godown in 2020 and was acquitted by a special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court in 2023. In October 2024, he died from a heart attack. His family believes his health declined rapidly because of the imprisonment, dismissal and prolonged legal proceedings.
In recent years in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), Article 311(2)(c) has been used to dismiss government employees on allegations of links to militants or security threats, often based on unverified past records or intelligence inputs, without a formal inquiry. These have become known as 311 dismissals or terminations.
Given how significantly it departs from the usual principle of “innocent until proven guilty”, this provision was intended for rare situations in which a departmental inquiry could put national security at risk, such as by exposing witnesses or sensitive information. It was never meant to replace due process or be used indiscriminately against civilian employees such as teachers and doctors.
Since 2021, around 90 government employees in J&K have been dismissed under Article 311(2)(c), according to media reports (here, here and here).
In Kashmir, dismissed government employees described lives upended by sudden loss of income, social stigma, psychological distress and prolonged legal uncertainty.
Many of the appeals against the dismissal orders remain pending before courts, including the High Court, and tribunals such as the Central Administrative Tribunal (CAT).
A Case Dismissed, A Death
While acquitting Wani, Justice O P Thakur of the Special Designated Court NIA, Pulwama, found that several witnesses did not support key allegations and described the structure as an ordinary storeroom with no knowledge that it was intended for militants, according to the ruling accessed by Article 14.
The judge held that the prosecution “failed to prove the case beyond any shadow of doubt” that the accused knowingly provided support or shelter to militants, emphasising that suspicion cannot replace proof.
Nazeer said the family’s troubles began during the Covid-19 lockdown in 2020, when his father allegedly argued with a senior police officer after intervening during the beating of shopkeepers accused of violating restrictions.
“My father told the officers that he had allowed the shopkeepers to open briefly,” he alleged. “There was a verbal altercation, and before leaving, the officer allegedly warned him that he would pay for it.”
Days later, police raided their pesticide godown and registered a case alleging that militants had used the premises as a hideout.
“Nothing was recovered from the shop,” Nazeer said. “But my father was dismissed from service on the basis of that FIR.”
Nazeer said his father returned from prison a changed man.
“He would sit alone for hours,” he said. “He worried constantly about the family, about finances, about our future.”
The family’s monthly income, Nazeer said, fell from more than Rs 1 lakh—what he said his father earned as a naib tehsildar—to only a few thousand rupees from pesticide sales.
“We sold ancestral land to repay debts,” he said. “Now even basic things feel difficult — food, medicines, education.”
Nazeer, now 34, earns a living by selling pesticides. His monthly income fluctuates between Rs 8,000 and Rs 15,000.
His mother suffers from chronic kidney disease, diabetes and hypertension, while Nazeer said he struggled to support his three younger siblings and continue the legal battle seeking pension and general provident fund benefits.
“Every court hearing costs money,” he said. “And every hearing gets delayed.”
Syed Riyaz Khawar, a Srinagar-based lawyer, claimed that Wani retired on 31 March 2021, but his termination order was issued by the commissioner/secretary to the government, general administration department, on 3 April 2021, three days after he retired, which Khawar argued would put him out of the ambit of Article 311(2)(c), which applies to current government employees.
Khawar said the termination was carried out solely to deny Wani his monthly retirement pension.
A Crackdown In J&K
Following the abrogation of its semi-autonomous status and demotion to a union territory in August 2019, J&K witnessed an intensified security framework aimed at dismantling separatist networks and preventing renewed unrest. Several separatist organisations were banned (here and here), while political leaders and activists were detained or arrested (here and here) under laws such as the Public Safety Act 1978 (PSA) and the UAPA.
Properties linked to alleged militants or overground workers (OGWs) were seized, while a new counterinsurgency term—“hybrid militant”— entered official discourse to describe individuals accused of carrying out attacks while continuing to live as civilians.
Critics argued such measures blurred distinctions between militants and alleged sympathisers, and the expanded security framework narrowed democratic space and curtailed civil liberties in the region.
The crackdown also included restrictions on government employment. Policies were introduced barring jobs for relatives of militants or individuals accused of stone-pelting, while government employees were warned against criticising official policies online. Several books related to Kashmir’s political history and the Partition were also banned, citing security concerns.
Any critical coverage by the media in J&K on state excess and human rights violations in the conflict region has been virtually wiped out.
Despite the return of an elected government following the October 2024 Assembly elections, Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has said that law and order remains under the lieutenant governor’s control, limiting the elected government’s role in matters such as Article 311(2)(c) dismissals, and has called for affected employees to be given a fair chance to defend themselves.
Principal secretary of the home department of J&K, Chandraker Bharti, disconnected the call after hearing the query, while inspector general of police V K Birdi did not respond to repeated calls, WhatsApp messages or email.
Detailed questionnaires seeking the official position of the J&K police and the home department on the process and basis for dismissing government employees under Article 311(2)(c), clarifying whether the dismissals were based solely on FIRs, intelligence inputs, or other evidence; what safeguards and review mechanisms existed before and after such action; how terms such as "security of the State" were applied in practice; and whether acquittals could lead to any reconsideration of dismissal were emailed to the home department and J&K Police on 21 May and 25 June 2026.
The questionnaires also requested official data on the numbers of dismissals, acquittals, and pending legal challenges, as well as the categories of cases involved, to assess the implementation, transparency, and accountability of the provision.
No response has been received as of the date of publication. We will update the story if we do receive a response.
Legal recourse lies before the CAT, which hears service matters, including the 311 terminations, with appeals to the J&K High Court. Zaffar Qureshi, a Srinagar-based lawyer, noted that over 45,000 Kashmir-related cases are pending before a single CAT bench, causing major delays.
The 2024 extension of CAT jurisdiction to universities in Jammu and Kashmir is also being challenged in the High Court on the grounds of their autonomous status.
In 2024, the union government extended CAT jurisdiction to universities in J&K. The move itself was challenged before the High Court, with petitioners arguing that universities were autonomous statutory institutions and should not fall within the tribunal's jurisdiction.
In at least two separate cases in J&K (here and here), Article 311(2)(c) dismissals were set aside by lower courts before being reinstated by the J&K High Court, which affirmed the right of the President or Governor to terminate government employees on the ground of “security of state”. Both these cases involved Article 311(2)(c) dismissals before 2019, when Article 370 was abrogated, revoking the special status of J&K.
There have been successful appeals against Article 311(2)(c) dismissals in other states, such as in Manipur, which were upheld by the relevant High Court.
Without Recourse
Not all dismissed employees, however, could sustain lengthy litigation.
Manzoor Ahmed Laway, a government school teacher from Mangam in Kulgam, was dismissed on 15 March 2024 from Government Primary School, Galwanpora.
Although the dismissal order, which Article 14 has seen, did not mention specific charges, media reports linked the action to FIRs alleging that he instigated a mob on 9 July 2016, a day after Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani was killed.
Laway, 40, rejected the allegations, saying he was not present when the protest broke out.
Before his dismissal, Laway earned nearly Rs 80,000 a month. Afterwards, he said he struggled to earn even Rs 1,500 a month.
“As the sole breadwinner, feeding the family is all I can think about,” he said. “A legal battle is beyond my reach.”
Three Educators
But the scope of dismissals extended beyond cases involving FIRs or alleged links to militancy. There were also cases where no criminal record or specific allegations appeared in the dismissal order.
Razya Sultana, 46, a head teacher (an official designation at some government schools, similar to a principal) at Middle School Khiram in Anantnag district, was dismissed in April 2021. No specific reason was mentioned in her termination order, which Article 14 has seen.
Her father, Mohammad Sultan Bhat, was associated with Jamaat-e-Islami, a socio-religious organisation banned by the Union government under the UAPA in February 2019. He had also contested the 1987 Assembly election in J&K as a candidate for the political alliance Muslim United Front.
Bhat was abducted and killed by unidentified militants in 1996.
Sultana said her dismissal triggered what she described as a “psychological war”.
“It is humiliating when a mother of two is summoned to a police station,” she said.
For Sultana, the social isolation was more devastating than the loss of her own income since her husband continues to earn.
“All our relatives have distanced themselves from us,” said Sultana. “They fear they will become targets too.”
“My children sometimes refuse to attend school,” she said. “They do not explain why, but there is a silence inside our home now.”
Sultana’s colleague at the same school, Sakeena Shani, 52, was also dismissed on 8 July 2021, without any specific allegations in her termination order, which Article 14 has seen.
Shani linked her dismissal to events preceding the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019, when she said police had allegedly asked her to sign an affidavit disassociating herself from Jamaat-e-Islami.
“I may have attended religious gatherings organised by Jamaat in the past,” she said, “but the organisation was not banned then.”
The police warned Shani that her salary would be withheld if she refused to sign the document, which she later believed was used against her.
Both Sultana and Shani challenged their dismissals before the CAT. They said their cases had not seen a substantive hearing in four years.
Among those challenging their dismissals was Muheet Ahmad Butt, a 49-year-old ‘Scientist D’ gazetted researcher at the post graduate department of computer science at the University of Kashmir, from Srinagar’s Shalimar locality, who now spends his time managing a small agricultural plot near his home.
Butt was dismissed from Kashmir University on 13 August 2022, after a police dossier accused him of radicalising students towards secessionism in 2016 during his tenure as president of the Kashmir University Teachers’ Association.
“That detail itself is inaccurate,” Butt said. “I held the position from 2017 to 2019.”
Butt alleged Article 311(2)(c) had been misused after he led an agitation against a senior university official.
“I was targeted because I challenged corruption inside the university,” he said.
Butt said he had travelled internationally for workshops and conferences before his dismissal.
“Had I been involved in anti-national activity, I would never have received passport clearances,” he said.
Butt said he lost an opportunity to join the University of Oman as an assistant professor after his dismissal. His passport was later seized, and his GP fund remained frozen.
“One day, my son came home saying his teachers told him he must have decent parents because he looked well-groomed,” Butt said. “They did not know his father had lost his job.”
“Those words stayed with me,” he said. “Sometimes I do not know how to respond.”
Butt challenged his dismissal before the J&K High Court, but the matter was later transferred to the CAT.
As families awaited court rulings and lawyers debated constitutional safeguards, Butt watched government buses halt outside his home each morning while his wife and sister left for work.
“My mother does not say anything,” he said. “But her silence says enough.”
16 Years Later
Khawar pointed to the case of Nighat Shaheen Chiloo, a gynaecologist at the sub-district hospital in Chadoora in Budgam district, who was dismissed under Article 311(2)(c) in June 2023, nearly 16 years after she participated in the postmortem examination of Asiya and Neelofar, two women whose deaths in 2009, widely believed in Kashmir to be at the hands of Indian armed forces, triggered widespread protests.
The central bureau of investigation later concluded that the cause of death for both the women was drowning, with no evidence of rape or murder.
The agency filed a chargesheet against 13 people—six doctors (including Chiloo and her colleague Bilal Ahmad Dalal), five lawyers and two others—for allegedly fabricating evidence, with charges including section 194 of the Ranbir Penal Code 1989 (giving or fabricating evidence with intent to procure conviction of capital offence). All 13 were granted bail in February 2010.
Chiloo and Dalal were accused of fabricating medical evidence to falsely implicate security forces in order to create unrest against the armed forces. Chiloo’s counsel argued she merely performed her role as part of a medical board.
“Article 311 is not intended to punish professional medical opinion,” Khawar said. “A team of doctors in Kashmir differed from another team in Delhi. That alone does not establish deliberate bias.”
Khawar, her lawyer, argued the administration was still constitutionally obligated to explain why a regular departmental inquiry was not feasible.
Chiloo declined to speak on the record for this story because she feared further repercussions following her dismissal.
Khawar said Chiloo’s dismissal caused severe financial strain, forcing her to sell jewellery she had saved for her daughters’ weddings and disrupting her daughters' medical education.
Around the same time, her husband’s contractual appointment as a doctor in Baramulla was also not extended. No reason was given.
Khawar said Article 311(2)(c) dismissals still had to satisfy the constitutional protections guaranteed under Articles 14 and 21, which ensured equality before the law and the protection of life and liberty.
“India is a democracy governed by institutions,” he said. “Not an authoritarian state.”
He said many dismissed employees experienced severe psychological distress.
“I have seen clients develop anxiety, depression and even suicidal tendencies,” he said.
“Most cannot find another job, especially after the age of 40. Yet they continue borrowing money because they still see hope in courtrooms.”
Losing Everything
Showkat Ahmad, 41, a daily-wage plumber and pipe fitter with the public health engineering department from Bijbehara in south Kashmir, earning Rs 9,000 a month, was removed in March 2026 after an FIR linked him to a 2019 encounter at his house.
“It was raining heavily that evening,” Ahmad recalled. “I was watching an IPL match in my newly constructed house.”
During search operations in the area, Ahmad said two armed militants entered his house and seized the family’s mobile phones.
“I pleaded with them to leave,” he said. “They told me a vehicle would come for them soon.”
Soon after, security forces knocked on the door. Ahmad said he immediately informed them about the militants’ presence, but was beaten.
He said he later watched his house burn during the gunfight.
“I have lost everything — my job, my home, my clothes,” he said.
Ahmad said his wife suffered from throat cancer and that he now depended on relatives for her treatment.
He now occasionally works as a plumber in remote villages while repaying loans taken out to rebuild his house.
“Some villagers accused me of informing the forces,” he said. “While authorities accused me of sheltering militants.”
(Marila Latif is the Kashmir-based editor of The Himalayan Post and reports on governance, politics, law and society in J&K.)
Get exclusive access to new databases, expert analyses, weekly newsletters, book excerpts and new ideas on democracy, law and society in India. Subscribe to Article 14.