One year after terror attack, Pahalgam remains off the tourist map

For most tourists heading to the picturesque meadows of Pahalgam in Kashmir, the first stop for many years has been a stone-paved pathway built along the banks of river Lidder.

Standing in its middle, a decorative frame of wooden beams with colorful letters saying “I love Pahalgam”, serves as a popular “selfie point” for travellers.

But now, just 200 metres away, a wall of black granite competes for attention. Two tricolours flutter on top of it. As you step closer, you see etched into stone the names of 26 people gunned down by militants on April 22 last year.

The memorial has come up about 6 km from the Baisaran meadow, the site of the terror attack.

As he stood looking up at the wall in mid-April, Manu Madhavan, a tourist from Kerala, described the experience as “a bit unsettling”.

“Until now, we had just heard about the Pahalgam massacre on television or read it in the newspaper,” said Madhavan, who was visiting Kashmir with his family. “Now, it feels real.”

But not many tourists are likely to share Madhavan’s experience – very few of them have been making their way to Pahalgam after last year’s terror attack.

The attack more than halved the number of tourists coming to Kashmir – from nearly 30 lakh in 2024, the number fell to less than 12 lakh in 2025, official data shows.

While tourist arrivals in the rest of Kashmir have largely recovered this year, Pahalgam, once a popular destination for travellers, continues to lag behind.

“Tourists prefer spots like Sonmarg and Gulmarg,” said Adil Ahmad, a cab operator in Srinagar. “There is a sense of fear about Pahalgam.”

Abdul Waheed Wani, president of the local ponywallah association, agreed. “Before April 22, 2025, there was one Pahalgam,” said Wani, who was among the first to reach Baisaran on the day of the attack. “Today’s Pahalgam is a different one.”

Security lapse

It was a sunny afternoon last year when a group of militants swooped down on the Baisaran meadow and shot 25 tourists in the head after identifying them by their religion. A local ponywalla was also killed in what was the deadliest attack on tourists in the history of Kashmir’s 37-year-old armed insurgency.

The attack came at a time when militancy-related violence in Kashmir had fallen to its lowest. Ever since the Modi government had scrapped the special status of Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019, the region’s security apparatus had come under the direct control of the Centre through its representative, the lieutenant governor.

However, on the day of the attack, despite the presence of hundreds of tourists in the area, no security personnel were deployed in the Baisaran meadows or along the trekking route leading up to it, survivors said.

After the gunshots rang out in the meadow, the first persons to respond were local ponywallas who earn a living by offering horse rides to tourists.

Wani, the president of the ponywalla association, still has on his phone WhatsApp voice notes that he sent out that day, beseeching more and more ponywallas to reach Baisaran and join the rescue operation.

“The police came twenty minutes after we had reached the spot,” he said.

Another ponywalla, Rayees Ahmad, recalled reaching the Baisaran meadows through a shortcut to help rescue the tourists. When he saw many of them were injured and bleeding, he borrowed shawls and fabrics from local sellers “to cover their wounds and prevent their blood loss”.

Wani added: “That day, none of us cared for our life. We just went and started rescuing people.”

Act of bravery

A ponywalla, Syed Adil Hussain Shah, even lost his life while trying to protect the tourists. According to eyewitness accounts, he confronted one of the militants in an attempt to stop him from firing upon the visitors. In the process, Shah sustained several bullet injuries, including two on his chest, said his father.

Shah, 29, a daily-wage worker from Anantnag’s Hapatnar village, was the eldest among his parents’ six children. He used to earn Rs 300- Rs 500 per trip for taking tourists on horseback to Baisaran.

His father Syed Haider Shah said: “We miss him a lot but then there is this contentment that he died while trying to save people irrespective of their religion or identity. He set an example of humanity for all of us.”

Despite the bravery and courage shown by the ponywallas, in the weeks after the attack, there was a rise in the vilification of Kashmiri Muslims in sections of the media.

A security crackdown in the region saw nearly 3,000 youth being detained for questioning.

Although security agencies said two of the three militants responsible for the massacre were Pakistanis, they demolished nine houses belonging to the families of local militants. This was a first in the Valley.

In July, Union home minister Amit Shah announced in Parliament that the three suspected militants involved in the Pahalgam attack had been killed in a gunfight with security forces in Srinagar.

‘Take us to Baisaran’

In the last one year, the Shah family has, somehow, learnt to live with the loss.

His parents wanted to visit the spot where their son fell to the bullets – but were unable to.

“I have never been to Baisaran in my life,” remarked Syed Haider Shah. “My wife and I tried to go to Baisaran a couple of times, but we weren’t allowed by the security forces.”

A week after the terror attack, the administration had ordered the closure of 48 of the 87 official tourist destinations in Kashmir Valley. By October, the administration reopened at least 28 spots for visitors. But the Baisaran meadow has remained shut, along with several other sightseeing spots in Pahalgam, said local people working in the tourism industry.

As a result, tourism-related businesses in Pahalgam continued to suffer. “I came here to check if there is any flow of tourists,” said a Srinagar local, whose hotel in Pahalgam has almost zero business since April 22 last year. “Last year, I had taken a loan of Rs 20 lakh and renovated my hotel before the season. After the Baisaran episode, my investment sank,” the hotelier said, adding that his hotel will continue to remain shut due to lack of tourists. “I will close this by evening and head back to Srinagar.”

“Earlier, a tourist would spend at least two nights in Pahalgam,” said Wani, the president of the ponywalla association. “But ever since the main sightseeing spots have been closed down for tourists, they return to Srinagar by evening.”

An activist in Pahalgam said the government – both the administration led by the Lieutenant Governor as well as the elected government led by Omar Abdullah – need to do more to attract tourists to Pahalgam.

The closure of tourist spots “sends the wrong message,” said the activist, who requested anonymity. “Why can’t just the government deploy security at these spots so that tourists can visit these places and be safe?”

He also questioned the specific closure of the Baisaran meadow. “A tourist from the mainland doesn’t have an idea of the geography of the place. When he comes to know that Baisaran is closed, he feels as if that place is under the control of militants,” the activist said.

The activist also suggested that the memorial wall for the victims of last year’s terror attack be relocated to a more appropriate spot. “Tourists come to experience nature and its beauty,” he said. “If the first thing they see on their arrival is a memorial of a massacre of tourists, it disturbs them and creates fear in their mind.”