For nearly two months, the flash-point region of Kashmir has been locked down. The Indian government has flooded it with troops. The internet has been cut off. Mobile phones don’t work.



Soldiers have ordered people to stay inside their homes or they will be shot. Anti-government militants have killed and threatened civilians as well. People can’t get to the hospital, they can’t communicate with loved ones, they can’t go to school or work. Everyday life has been paralyzed.



This all began Aug. 5 when India announced stunning news: It was stripping Jammu and Kashmir state, India’s only Muslim-majority state, of the autonomy it had held since the 1940s. The territory will soon be cut in half and each piece will become a federal enclave.



The Indian government, which is controlled by a popular Hindu nationalist political party, says these moves are necessary to bring peace to Kashmir. For decades, the region has been racked by unrest, rebellion, warfare and bloodshed. Pakistan, India’s rival, also claims parts of Kashmir and is accused of stirring up an anti-India insurgency.



Indian officials knew that stripping Kashmir’s statehood would be deeply unpopular. And the Kashmir Valley, the most restive part of the state and home to as many as 8 million people, remains under a punishing blockade.

The photographer Atul Loke spent four weeks in Kashmir over two trips in August and September for The New York Times. Here is what he saw.