SRINAGAR, India (AP) – When massive anti-India protests erupted in Indian-control Kashmir three months ago after the killing of a charismatic militant leader, Aqib Mir was among tens of thousands of Kashmiris who defied curfew and clashed with government forces.
He chanted for freedom from Indian rule. He hurled abuses and sometimes rocks at police and paramilitary soldiers. Three months later, he joined thousands of other young Kashmiris to try and get a job with the local police.
“Unemployment, what else,” the 24-years-old Mir said when asked why he had lined up inside a soccer stadium in Kashmir’s main city of Srinagar to appear for a physical fitness test to become a cop.
“We want freedom from India, that’s our fundamental right. But we also have to earn livelihood.”
He’s among some 20,000 young people, the majority of them men, who are trying out for 8,000 jobs advertised by the state police in the troubled Himalayan region that is wracked by rampant unemployment.