As mosques come under police scanner in India-administered Kashmir, the faithful ask: why

On a cold January afternoon in Srinagar in India-administered Kashmir, Abdul Rashid stands inside his neighbourhood mosque long after the noon prayers had ended. 

At 65, he had seen the city change many times, through crackdowns, curfews, gunflights, and fragile calm. Still, the papers in his hands unsettled him in a way few things had before.

The multi-page form, delivered by the local police to the mosque’s management committee, asked routine questions at first: the mosque’s denomination, year of construction, and funding sources. 

Then came the details that made Rasid pause — the ‘Aadhaar’ numbers of those who lead prayers, the IMEI numbers of their mobile phones, and personal details of their families.

Aadhaar is India’s primary national identity system, comparable to a Social Security Number in the United States or a National Insurance number in the United Kingdom, but it is linked to biometric data and integrated across a wide range of digital and government services.

“I have prayed here my entire life,” Rashid tells TRT World. “No one ever asked us these things, not even during the worst years of conflict.”

Srinagar is the capital of the India-administered side of the contested region claimed by both India and Pakistan. One part of Kashmir is administered by Pakistan.

Earlier this month, across the Kashmir Valley, police began collecting detailed data on mosques and the people who run them. 

For many Kashmiris, the exercise feels less like an administrative survey and more like the state stepping inside one of the last spaces still considered sacred and communal. 

The survey is being carried out through structured questionnaires circulated by local police units. It seeks granular information about mosques ranging from their sectarian affiliation – Barelvi, Deobandi, Hanafi or Ahle-Hadith – to land ownership, bank accounts, and internal administration. 

More troubling for many are the personal details being collected. The forms list imams, muezzins, preachers, and mosque committee members, asking for identification numbers, banking information, and even social media activity.

A region without local oversight

The unease surrounding the survey is sharpened by the political context in which it is unfolding.

Since August 2019, when New Delhi revoked Jammu and Kashmir’s semi-autonomous status, control over policing and security has rested with a federally appointed Lieutenant Governor, currently Manoj Sinha, and local elected representatives no longer have authority over law and order.

While the move was framed as necessary for stability and development, critics say it has deepened alienation by weakening local accountability.

Muslims constitute more than 97 percent of the population in the Kashmir Valley and nearly 70 percent of the wider Union Territory, according to the 2011 Census. 

In this landscape, mosques are not merely places of worship. They are spaces for charity, education and collective decision-making, roles that expanded during decades of conflict with civic institutions faltered. 

That is another reason the survey has drawn sharp reactions from religious bodies and political leaders, who see it as an intrusion into constitutionally protected religious life.

The Muttahida Majlis-e-Ulema (MMU), an umbrella body of Islamic organisations led by cleric and political leader Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, called the survey “unprecedented and invasive,” warning that it violates the right to privacy and religious freedom guaranteed under the Indian Constitution.

“This has caused widespread anxiety among imams, religious workers and the general public,” the MMU said, adding that the exercise appeared to single out Muslim institutions.

Political leaders across party lines echoed the concern. 

National Conference Member of Parliament Aga Syed Ruhullah, whose party has limited powers in the region, said the survey went far beyond routine security measures and risked turning religious practice into a regulated activity.

“When preachers know they are being profiled, sermons will change, not because of law, but because of fear,” he said.

Others pointed to the broader implications of data collection in a region already saturated with identity databases. 

“How many layers of surveillance does a citizen need to live under?” asked Communist Party of India legislator Mohammed Yousuf Tarigami, calling the move “unwarranted and deeply alienating.”

Former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti was more direct. Holding up a copy of the police questionnaire, she accused authorities of targeting Kashmiri Muslims under the guise of security. 

“If profiling religious institutions is necessary, why are mosques the only ones under scrutiny?” she asks.

A police official involved in the exercise tells TRT World that the survey focused excessively on mosques, with little attention given to temples, gurdwaras, or churches. When asked if there are plans to extend the survey in the coming days, he said that, as of now, no such instructions have been issued.

So far, police and administration officials have offered no public explanation for the exercise, leaving space for speculation and fear to grow.

When surveillance enters the sermon

India-administered Kashmir has seen surveillance before. But residents say this moment feels different. 

First, the survey is being conducted without local political oversight. Second, the depth of data being collected—IMEI numbers, Aadhaar details, banking access—reflects a shift from physical surveillance to digital profiling.

Third, the exercise is openly institutional, using standardised questionnaires rather than informal intelligence gathering, giving it a permanence that many find unsettling.

“This feels like documentation for future control, not present security,” says a retired government official in Srinagar who requested anonymity.

After the abrogation of Article 370 in August 2019, the region experienced prolonged communication blackouts, mass detentions, and sweeping administrative changes. 

Violence has declined since, but critics argue that stability has come through bureaucratic control rather than political consent.  

The mosque survey is being viewed within this lens, not as an isolated act, but as part of a larger reordering of power and public life. 

For many imams, the questionnaire has altered the emotional climate inside mosques.

“Before Friday prayers, I now think twice about every word,” says an imam from south Kashmir, who asked not to be named. “Religion teaches us to speak truth, but when you know your phone number and Aadhaar are on record, silence feels safer.”

A mosque committee member in Baramulla says the survey has created unease among volunteers. “These are teachers, engineers, shopkeepers, ordinary people who serve without pay. Now they ask me, ‘Will this affect my job or passport?’ I have no answers.”

Another cleric sums it up quietly: “They have not shut our mosques. They have entered our minds.”

For Rashid, the elderly worshipper in Srinagar, the fear is quieter but deeper. He worries that younger men who lead prayers voluntarily will step away to protect their futures. “Who will take responsibility then?” he asks. “Faith cannot survive paperwork and fear.”

While mosques endure raids, closures and curfews, something more fragile is at stake this time. “Worship is meant to be free,” Rashid says, folding the form back onto the prayer mat. 

“Once fear enters our mosques, we don’t just lose privacy, we lose the very heart of our community.”