A revenue officer, two school teachers, a university professor, a daily wager, and a doctor are among around 90 Kashmir government employees reportedly dismissed under an obscure and little-used Constitutional provision that allows termination without a departmental inquiry on security grounds/ 

By Marila Latif

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). 

This story was originally published in article-14.com. Read the full story here.