India appoints veteran politician in-charge of occupied Kashmir

Manoj Sinha will replace career bureaucrat G.C. Murmu as lieutenant governor of Jammu and Kashmir.

SRINAGAR, India (Web Desk) – Indian government named a former telecoms minister on Thursday to lead the region of occupied Kashmir. Manoj Sinha, a leader in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ruling party, will replace career bureaucrat G.C. Murmu as lieutenant governor of Jammu and Kashmir. The appointment came after G.C. Murmu resigned following first anniversary of the revocation of Kashmir’s constitutional autonomy. Last August, Modi’s government removed special privileges accorded to Jammu and Kashmir, India’s only Muslim-majority state, took away its statehood and split it into two federally-administered territories by carving out Buddhist-dominated Ladakh. The move angered Kashmiris as well as Pakistan. India and Pakistan have fought two of their three wars over the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir.