In the dark days of early 1990, when the Kashmir Valley was convulsed by violence and the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits had begun, 27-year-old Sarla Bhat, a young nurse from Anantnag, stood out as a symbol of courage. She was posted at the Sher-i-Kashmir Institute of Medical Sciences (SKIMS) in Srinagar, where, despite repeated militant diktats ordering Pandits to resign from government service and abandon the Valley, she continued to work, believing her profession and service to patients were above fear. On the night of 18 April 1990, militants associated with the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front barged into the Habba Khatoon nurses’ hostel at SKIMS, dragged Sarla away, and vanished into the night. Her terrified colleagues could do nothing but pray for her safe return. The following morning, 19 April, her bullet-riddled body was found in Umar Colony, Mallabagh (Srinagar). A chilling note left behind branded her a “police informer,” justifying her execution. Survivors and family members later recounted that she bore signs of torture and burn marks, suggesting she endured immense suffering before her death. Her brutal killing shook the small Pandit community that still remained in the Valley and reinforced the climate of fear that was forcing thousands to flee their ancestral homes.

For Sarla’s family, the tragedy was unbearable. Her father, Shambu Nath, meticulously preserved every clipping, police paper, and letter relating to her death, while her younger sister recalled memories of a lively, playful sibling cut down in the prime of her life. For decades, however, the case remained frozen in time, an FIR gathering dust at Nigeen police station, with no arrests and no accountability. Sarla’s story became part of the larger unspoken trauma of Kashmiri Pandits—women and men targeted not for who they were individually, but because of their identity as Hindus in the Valley. In August 2025, thirty-five years after her death, the Jammu and Kashmir State Investigation Agency (SIA) reopened the case, raiding eight locations across Srinagar, including the homes of former JKLF leaders, in a bid to gather evidence afresh. For many, this belated investigation is not just about punishing those who killed Sarla, but about acknowledging a history of targeted persecution that was long denied. Sarla Bhat’s murder is remembered not only as the silencing of a young nurse but as a grim emblem of the genocidal campaign that uprooted an entire community from its homeland.