The deliberate annihilation of cultural heritage in times of war is far more than a tragic byproduct of military engagement; it is a calculated assault on the collective memory and the very soul of a civilisation. When a minority community’s temples, libraries and sacred sites are reduced to rubble, the aggressors are not merely destroying stone and mortar, but are instead attempting to rewrite history and erase the tangible proof of that group’s existence on the land. This phenomenon, which has been increasingly recognised as a form of cultural cleansing, serves a strategic purpose in modern asymmetrical warfare because it demoralises the target population and severs their ancestral link to the territory. Throughout the twentieth and twenty first centuries, we have witnessed this pattern from the systematic looting of Europe during the Second World War to the more recent desecration of ancient sites in Syria, Iraq and the former Yugoslavia. In each instance, the destruction was a performative act intended to signal the total dominance of one identity over another, yet the international legal frameworks designed to prevent such atrocities often remain reactive and structurally inadequate. The 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict was born out of the ashes of global war, but its effectiveness is frequently compromised by the broad exception of military necessity. This loophole allows commanders to justify the targeting of cultural sites if they are deemed to provide a military advantage, a provision that has been exploited repeatedly in asymmetric conflicts where insurgents use religious structures as shields. While the Second Protocol of 1999 attempted to tighten these standards and criminalise the intentional destruction of heritage, the reality on the ground in regions of non international armed conflict remains grim because non state actors are rarely deterred by the threat of international tribunals.

In the specific and deeply complex context of the Kashmir Valley, the protection of minority heritage has become a battleground for identity and historical narrative. The region was once defined by a syncretic pluralism known as Kashmiriyat, where Hindu, Sikh and Islamic traditions lived in a delicate and beautiful overlap, but this fabric was violently torn apart with the onset of the insurgency in the late 1980s. The mass exodus of the Kashmiri Pandit community, the indigenous Brahmin minority, led to what can only be described as a custodianship vacuum. When the primary guardians of these sacred geographies were forced to flee for their lives, their temples and shrines were left vulnerable to both active vandalism and the more insidious decay of neglect. Government records and community surveys provide a jarring contrast in the scale of this loss, as official figures cite that approximately two hundred and eight temples were damaged, whereas community organisations like the Kashmiri Pandit SangharshSamiti argue that the true number exceeds five hundred when including holy springs and sacred groves. This discrepancy highlights a fundamental failure in the administrative mechanisms intended to protect the properties of the displaced. The 1997 Migrant Immovable Property Act was designed to vest the custody of such assets in the hands of the state, yet for decades, these sites were subjected to systemic encroachment by land mafias and even government departments themselves. This administrative apathy has allowed for the gradual erasure of the Hindu footprint in the Valley, a process that is only now being challenged by significant judicial interventions.
The Sikh community in Kashmir has similarly faced profound challenges in preserving their historical and religious integrity in this high conflict environment. The vulnerability of this micro minority was exposed in the most horrific manner during the Chittisinghpura massacre of 2000, where thirty five Sikh men were shot dead in cold blood outside their Gurudwaras. Such acts of violence transform heritage sites from centres of communal life into securitised memorials, fundamentally altering the way a community interacts with its own history. Beyond the threat of direct violence, the Sikh heritage in the region suffers from a lack of formal recognition and the double edged sword of modernisation. In many instances, the traditional architecture of historical
Gurudwaras is lost not to bombs, but to well intentioned but destructive renovation projects that replace ancient frescoes and Nanakshahi bricks with modern marble and glazed tiles. This internal erosion of authenticity is as much a threat as external aggression, as it severs the visual and material continuity with the past. For both Pandits and Sikhs, the survival of their physical heritage is inextricably linked to their political and social security, leading to persistent demands for specialised legislation, such as the Kashmiri Hindu Shrines Bill, which would grant the community autonomous control over their religious assets.
The crisis of heritage protection is not limited to the physical ruins of temples or the walls of Gurudwaras, but extends to the catastrophic loss of intangible cultural heritage. When a community is uprooted and scattered in a diaspora, their language, rituals and knowledge systems begin to wither. Among the displaced Kashmiri Pandits, the fluency of the Kashmiri language is plummeting among the younger generation and the elaborate rituals of Kashmir Shaivism are being replaced by more homogenised religious practices due to the loss of traditional priests and the logistical hurdles of exile. In this context, heritage preservation must embrace modern technology as a form of cultural resistance. Initiatives like Radio Sharda, which broadcasts in the Kashmiri language to a global diaspora and the GyanBharatam Mission, which is digitising thousands of fragile manuscripts in the Sharda and Persian scripts, represent vital efforts to secure the intellectual and spiritual legacy of the region. These digital archives ensure that even if the physical sites are lost to conflict or time, the knowledge they contain remains accessible to future generations.
The most potent symbol of this yearning for reconnection is the movement to establish a pilgrimage corridor to Sharda Peeth, which currently lies in ruins across the Line of Control in Pakistan occupied Kashmir. Once a pre-eminent centre of learning in the ancient world, Sharda Peeth is inaccessible to the devotees who hold it sacred, making its restoration a matter of international diplomacy as much ascultural preservation. The recent reconstruction of a proxy temple at Teetwal, located right at the edge of the border, serves as a poignant reminder of the community’s resilience and their refusal to let their most significant spiritual landmark fade into oblivion. Since 2019, there has been a noticeable shift in the state’s approach toward heritage in Jammu and Kashmir, with the administration integrating the restoration of religious sites into urban development projects like the Smart City Mission. The rebuilding of the Raghunath Temple in Srinagar, which had stood in a dilapidated state for three decades, is a significant step toward reclaiming the pluralistic identity of the Valley. However, physical restoration is only the beginning of a much longer journey. True preservation requires a shift in consciousness where the majority population views the heritage of the minority as part of their own shared history, rather than as the remnants of an unwanted other.
Protecting minority heritage in conflict zones requires a proactive rather than a reactive strategy. It necessitates the enforcement of international law with teeth, the empowerment of local communities to act as the primary custodians of their history and the recognition that the destruction of a single shrine in a remote valley is a loss for all of humanity. Heritage must be viewed not as a collection of static monuments but as a living bridge to peace and reconciliation. In the case of Kashmir, the survival of Pandit and Sikh heritage is the ultimate litmus test for the region’s ability to return to its pluralistic roots. Only when the prayers return to the temples, the ancient scripts are taught in the schools and the corridors of faith are opened across borders can we say that the battle for heritage has been won. The world must realise that when we allow the history of a minority to be erased, we are essentially permitting the narrowing of the human experience, leaving us all impoverished by the silence that follows. The preservation of these sites is a moral imperative that transcends politics, for they are the only witnesses to the civilisations that came before us and the only legacy we can truly offer to those who come after.