As violence ebbs, Kashmiris shyly take to alcohol

By Sheikh Mushtaq

SRINAGAR, India (Reuters) - Residents of Indian Kashmir, the country's only state with a Muslim majority, are drinking more and more alcohol, excise officials said, after years of intimidation by Islamist militants.

Liquor shops, beauty parlours and cinemas were closed in the Kashmir Valley after a Muslim separatist revolt against Indian rule broke out in 1989 and conservative Islamic ideas were propagated by armed militant groups.

But as violence has decreased since India and Pakistan began a peace process in 2004 over the disputed territory of Kashmir, liquor traders are back in business.

Half a dozen liquor shops and scores of beauty parlours have reopened across Kashmir. A lone cinema in Srinagar, Kashmir's summer capital, is also entertaining strife-weary residents.

"More than 1.2 million bottles of IMFL (Indian-made foreign liquor) and beer were sold in the Kashmir Valley in the past one year, which is of course the highest quantity since militancy began," said an official in Kashmir's excise department, who asked for anonymity because he is not allowed to be quoted in the media.

About 5.5 million people live in the Kashmir Valley.

The official said only 414,000 bottles were sold the year before that -- almost all of them to men.

The department is processing dozens of applications for licenses to open more liquor shops, a trade which was traditionally run by Hindus.