Around forty people, mostly Muslim, met at Nees and Blackstone after sunset for a vigil for Kashmir on October 27. The vigil was organized by Saadat Farooqi. To the best of his knowledge, Farooqi and his family of six are the only people from Kashmir in Fresno. “We may not create big news that’s going to be heard all over the world,” he said, “but we have to follow our conscience and speak for those that cannot speak.”

Farooqi explained that India made an incursion into Muslim-majority Kashmir on August 5. There are now 800,000 Indian soldiers in Kashmir guarding 8 million people. Kashmir is under curfew, he said, and there are many arrests, especially of young people, who are being tortured by Indian forces. “It is an open-air jail,” Farooqi said. He said that the Hindu Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is a fascist leader.

Vigil for Kashmir in Fresno