The Real Well-wishers of Kashmir

Today morning as I was rushing through to get to my office, in the brief movements of relief while on the metro, looking at the crowed of befittingly dressed women, men young and old going through their daily morning chores to reach their offices, I somehow was stuck on the concept of “anthropocentrism” and how we perceive our reality emanating from ourselves with us at the center of all that is happening either to us or around us. How we evaluate, process, make decisions (be it rational or even irrational), act and go about our lives on the daily basis with ourselves at the very center of our universe. And yet at the same time most of us are so invested in the spiral or the web of life we seldom understand our own deep rooted conscious or even subconscious instinctual impulses, inherited and accumulated over the years or even generations and their bearing on the way we think, act and lead our lives.

In the flight of such thought I realized we kashmiris in this sense are radically anthropocentric or more precisely ethnocentric as a community (and I being a kashmiri myself am no exception). We almost take it as a fact that the world revolves around us on its own volition and in this regard at least the immediate world has not given us any less reason to believe in it. Tripping on this trail of thought obviously led me to think about the history and the narrative around the Kashmir. And in all this cacophony of us and them, with or without I started thinking who the real well wishers of Kashmir are?

No one can deny that such people exist. Almost every one who thinks and talks Kashmir regardless of leanings, understanding or agenda at least considers her/himself as a well wisher of Kashmir and Kashmiri people if not the whole of erstwhile state of Jammu and Kashmir. So complying with my old canny habit of making checklists I started making a mental list of attributes of a person who could be taken as a true well-wisher of Kashmir based on my understandings and engagement with the place, people and the issue over the years and here it goes:

1. Doesn’t stereotype or romanticize Kashmir and Kashmiris be it positive or negative, social, political, religious, ethnic or cultural. We are utterly humans as flawed and as good as anyone else (I myself may be guilty of this). A part of what has happened and is happening is our mistake and the other part is of circumstances and external forces which were not in our control to begin with.
2. Neither underplays nor exaggerates the flawed governmental policy in Kashmir be it those of the centre or those of the state government over the years. Plus there must be in such person an acknowledgment of the political corruption of our leaders regardless of them being from any political party or leaning or them being from centre, state’s mainstream or the separatist.
3. Neither underplays nor exaggerates the wrong doings of security forces in Kashmir. Kashmir has been conflict ridden for around three decades now. There have been instances of excesses by security forces, which are documented. Need less to say these excess could have been avoided and they does raises question mark. And as a well-wisher, I would strongly support the call for Justice and reconciliation to untarnish the credibility and image of the security forces in Kashmir.
4. Acknowledges the communal nature of the Azaadi movement. “Aazaadi” is generally taken to be a progressive term meaning liberty and freedom but in Kashmir the term has its roots in communal two-nation theory, majoritarian religious fundamentalism and ethnic exclusivity as opposed to the tenets of actual concept of liberty. Anyone not acknowledging this fact is either cognitively dissonant, biased or has some agenda.
5. Isn’t apologetic for the wrong doings of Islamic terrorist and their communal underground and over-ground supporters. The narrative around Kashmir is filled with questioning the atrocities of security forces and wrong governmental policies (and rightly so when such questions are credible) but not much is ever said or questioned about atrocities caused by the gun toting terrorists and their support group towards their fellow kashmiris itself. The recent incident of the murder of an innocent shopkeeper in Parimpora, Srinagar who defied the shut-down (bandh) call of the militants, probably just to make an honest dignified income instead of living on alms.
6. Is completely against the gun culture, wants and works for peace, prosperity and welfare of every group in the state. Any one who knows even a bit about kashmir knows how the arrival of gun and gun-culture has rendered generations after generations to complete waste. “Those who live by gun, die by gun” and yet there are instances where such gun-toting individuals are eulogized, treated as martyrs and portrayed as heroes. Any one doing that could never be a well-wisher of Kashmir.
7. Acknowledges the general religious fundamentalism, patriarchy, misogyny in the Kashmiri society and the othering of any one who talks and condemns it. Religious fundamentalism, patriarchy, misogyny are some of the general traits of South Asian countries but in regards to Kashmir this acknowledgement become more important because such issues get overshadowed by the conflict and anyone raising such issue is castigated, ridiculed and often silenced.
8. Acknowledges the plight of the religious and other minorities in Kashmir. First of all to state that there is no state minority commission in Jammu and Kashmir. Apart from that the fate of Kashmiri Pandits, Sikhs and other religious minorities over the decades is no secret tale. Moreover the intra-religious oppression ensued by the Shia-Sunni tension or the anti-Ahamdies xenophobia also exist. In the same context the discrimination faced by the member of Valmiki community and the refugees of west-Pakistan living almost disenfranchised in the state for decades needs to be highlighted.
9. It is Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh for them not just Kashmir. Any true well wisher would obviously acknowledge in addition to Kashmiris, the plight of the non-kashmiris in the erstwhile state. there ought to be an acknowledgement of the years of skewed discrimination suffered by the people of non-kashmiri region and community in the erstwhile state.
10. Doesn’t peddle conspiracy theories or get into comparison of miseries in order to support their agenda or narrative. Conspiracy theories, misinformation and fake news entered Kashmir way before they became main-stream world over. I wonder if there’s a land more fertile for conspiracy theories than Kashmir. There is a conspiracy theory for every thing from the surveillance chip in the led bulbs distributed by the government to the famous “Jagmohan Conspiracy theory” of Kashmiri Pandit exodus. In addition there’s a knack for comparison of miseries from all the sides, as in who suffered more and it is either used as a tool of whataboutry or to denigrate other’s suffering.
11. Hasn’t and Isn’t looking to do Politics or make a career over the dead-bodies of either Kashmiris or the security forces personnel. Kashmir right from the start of conflict was treated as a big boiling pot and it was in the interests of many to keep the pot boiling because it attracted money and luxuries for such individuals from all sides. For others if it wasn’t money, it was something else-political brownies, news-reports, books, academic careers etc. A self sustaining ecosystem originated, survives and thrives on what some call “a conflict economy” of Kashmir. If there is no problem in Kashmir, there would be no money, no funding, no intellectual or academic exposure, no burning news.

I think that’s enough tripping on Kashmir for the day and its obvious that the list is non-exhaustive and is not be considered as a final judgement. Here, I’d, as a well-wisher of Kashmir like to conclude this with a few lines of a poem I wrote many years ago.

“All I dream of;
Kashmir;
white snow; hot kangri;
dark Kehva; bright saffron.

All I dream of;
Kashmir,
red chinar of autumn,
yellow mustard of springs,
a pinch-sweet happiness
warm peace, no bitterness.”