Kashmiriyat- Healing The Soul -10

Sushil Kumar Arazbegi Kaul

 

Corrigendum: In the Koshur Samachar issues of September October and November, 2022, we, wrongly, published Kashmiriyat Healing The Soul-Sunil Kumar Kaul Arazbegi We should have published Sushil Kumar Arazbegi In the October issue we gave the number of the series as 7 We should have published: 8 We regret the mistakes. Editor

 

Our family house at Sathu, Barbarshah, Srinagar (right on the Bund of Chounth Kul) was first looted by the people in our locality, by our immediate neighbour & then set on fire. The neighbour is the present-day occupant of our house.

They do not lose a single opportunity to defame, denigrate & denounce us Kashmiri Pandits & the Indian State, internationally & on all social networking sites, although they survive & thrive on its largess.

The trauma & hurt such acts of vandalism & religious bigotry of criminal elements among Kashmiri Muslim community caused me & my community cannot be easily forgotten or ignored by history.

The tragedy is that over the last 30 years no sections, or a very few, among the so-called fellow Kashmiri Muslim brethren have had the desire or courage to publicly condemn the acts of criminals within their own fold or at least say sorry for their atrocities or acts of vandalism.

To add insult to injury, some vested interests among the Muslims, without caring for the sentiments or the sensitivities of their fellow Hindu Kashmiris, spread irrational & irresponsible lies by blaming our migration from Kashmir to the scheming of the then Governor of J&K. The truth is that the unscrupulous & opportunist elements among the Kashmiri Muslims, in the garb of "Kashmir movement", usurped unlawfully & illegally the movable assets, land & houses of Kashmiri Pandits all over the Valley.

These Muslims forcibly occupied & grabbed our vacant & unguarded properties generally for free or at best by paying abysmally low prices. When people build houses on the graves of others, it is natural that they cannot live in peace as their own conscience will play a spoil sport- this is the system of natural justice.

The Kashmiri Muslims, including the mainstream & separatist leaders, in today's complex political & economic scenario, I find are appearing to be a confused lot replete with self-contradictions. While anything Indian is evil & immoral for them, be it Indian democracy, economy, people, leaders, even cricket team, they happily survive & live on the funds of the Govt. of India. Many so-called respectable & upright individuals among them get regular monthly doles from the Govt. of India agencies.

Their double standards are visible when they freely send their children to schools & colleges in other states of India for education & also look for work or business opportunities without batting an eyelid. India bashing & glorification of anything Islamic or Pakistani has become their pastime & second nature. Their behaviour obviously is not always based on the realistic assessment or merits of each individual case or situation but generally on narrow religio- political considerations.

They as a rule will condemn & see evil motives in any re-conciliatory or reformatory acts of Indian people or the Government concerning the Muslim community members in Kashmir but will conveniently turn a blind eye or keep mum when it comes to the heinous acts & crimes committed by them against hundreds of thousands of unarmed & peace-loving Kashmiri Pandits.

The Kashmiri Muslims are today certainly facing a number of hardships due to their continuing conflict in the name of the freedom struggle or occupation by Indian forces. This unfortunately is essentially a direct consequence of the misguided actions of some of them & I also believe due to the curse "badd dua or aah- e-badd" they got from their Kashmiri Hindu neighbours & co-habitats for centuries.

Batta Loot - My father after my shifting to Jammu I recall told me with a lot of sadness & pain that during his lifetime this was the third onslaught or the migration he & his family was facing. The first being the "Batta loot" of 1931 which had left deep scars on his psyche & then in 1947 he had to migrate to Delhi after selling & disposing off a fairly large chunk of his land & property.

It is ironical but true that July 13th, 1931, is remembered as "Batta Loot" by our KP community, is nowadays celebrated as "Martyr's Day" by the Muslim majority community in

Kashmir. This however does not have a universally shared appeal in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. Jammu Dogras for obvious reasons cannot find much cause for celebration on that date. But strangely in the valley the memory of that day's happenings has long haunted Kashmiri Pandits by recollections of the organised attacks on their community - the day is remembered generally by Kashmiri Pandits as "Batta Loot".

Neither the sectarian events of that day in Srinagar or elsewhere nor the death toll of twenty-two demonstrators and one policeman seem as outstanding as to command remembrance.

History tells us that on June 25th, 1931, Abdul Qadir, identified by some as a Pathan and others as a Punjabi servant of a European vacationing in Kashmir, made an inflammatory speech at a meeting held in a Srinagar 'mosque' that condemned the Dogra maharaja and incited his audience to kill Hindus and burn their temples. He was promptly arrested.

On July 13th, when Abdul Qadir was to be tried at the Central Jail in Srinagar, a crowd had attempted to enter the premises to protest his prosecution. Retaliating, the police fired into the gathering that then scattered and went on a rampage in Srinagar city. In Maharajgunj, a locality of Srinagar inhabited predominantly by Kashmiri Pandits and Punjabi Hindu traders, crowds of Muslims attacked shops, looted large quantities of goods and committed indiscriminate assaults. Hindus became victims of the mad mob frenzy even in Vicharnag Khanakah Mohalla, in Srinagar city and at Shopian and Anantnag town. This news was carried by the "Tribune" of 14th July. The 13 July 1931, until 1947 had represented or symbolised the Muslim struggle against the Dogra monarchy. Several historians have quoted this date to mark the beginning of the 'freedom struggle' of Kashmiris against the Dogra rule.

The decades immediately following 1947 could still be remembered with buoyancy and hope for nation-building but after 1989 it came to be known for quite a different need in Kashmir- that of a Muslim or Islamic national identity or "Azadi" Kashmiri Muslims generally believe that this happened primarily because of the freedom insufficiently achieved under the Indian dispensation on the one hand, and a final break with India's unkempt democratic promises on the other.

Simultaneously after 1990, no memory of Kashmir's past could properly justify or ignore a gaping hole in its society, as the valley was vacated of its most important minority of the Kashmiri Pandits, the memory of Martyrs' Day has since then come to be partitioned.

Muslims of Kashmir have unfortunately & without any sound basis always consciously or otherwise carried a hurt & blamed the Pandit community for their general social backwardness, illiteracy and the present plight. The fact however is that the Muslims who always had an overwhelming majority ruled the state for about six hundred years & the so-called present day plight of Kashmiri Muslims could in no way be the handiwork of or attributed to Pandits. It was & has to be seen as a result of their Muslim legacy bequeathed to them. through six hundred years of Muslim rule or misrule.

Pandits were always underprivileged & underdogs, but were an advanced and civilised section of Kashmiri society by virtue of their liberalism in thought & practice. They reoriented themselves easily without any undue interference from their religious or social leaders. Simultaneously, they adopted the new trends of thought and education to improve their lives. The majority community unfortunately has always been in a state of denial and therefore it always stood in the way of forging a common & shared future in Kashmir.

Exodus Ordeals - On 15th February, 1990, I was suddenly rendered homeless & a refugee in my own land. On reaching Jammu from Srinagar on the 15th February night I had no option but to stay with my family at my office guest house at Gandhi Nagar for a little more than a month. I later shifted to a three-bedroom rented accommodation in Trikuta Nagar from 1st of April, 1990. We had practically no household goods or baggage to carry to the rented accommodation.

My wife & my cousin Bushan Lal (Lalji), despite my protestations, travelled to Srinagar by air in the last week of March, 1990. The main purpose for my wife was to bring back our much harassed domestic servant Yograj & the Lhasa dog, besides some essential household utensils & bedding.

She found to her dismay that one of our well-to-do Muslim neighbour, Mohammad Ismail, a Hanji (boatmen community), whose family had long back bought a portion of our family-owned land & constructed a huge house, was continuously borrowing or plainly stealing our stored provisions (rice, cooking oils & charcoal etc) from our servant without any shame.

My wife had called up two of our close Muslim family friends & told them of her ordeal, which obviously they were fully aware of. These family friends of ours not only refused to come & meet her at our house, but told her that if they are seen at our house they themselves would be exposed to retaliation & harm from the terrorist ranks.

Another Muslim neighbour of ours & his teen-aged sons, living on our back side who had bought one of our old houses just a few years back, were continually trespassing, trooping into our house at will through the backdoor & threatening the servant. This family incidentally, to begin with, looted all our house assets & eventually took over the house. They are the present occupants of the house.

Despite grave danger to her life, my wife showed great courage in bringing back our marooned domestic help, the family pet & some items of bedding & clothing. She somehow managed to reach the Tourist Centre at Srinagar in a small Automobile Crane (for lack of proper vehicle) & then boarded a regular Bus to Jammu.

Meanwhile, I had arranged for some quick & cheap house essentials like, folding cots, wooden diwan, kitchen utensils, groceries, provisions, folding chairs etc. My friend Ranjit Malhotra (son of erstwhile Governor of Punjab Surendra Nath) loaned a gas stove & a cylinder helping me make our kitchen operational. We started living & surviving with the bare minimum.

My parents, who used to spend the winter months at Delhi, decided to come to Jammu to see me & my family. My father, who was used to all comforts in life, was shocked to see us living in the house without any proper crockery, furniture, room coolers or a refrigerator. During this period even my youngest brother Sanjay's family came to live with me consequent upon his transfer to Jammu. Surinder Ganjoo, my friend, used to frequently drop in & try to encourage my sagging morale. My financial liquidity was under strain. The Punjab National Bank, Amira Kadal Srinagar Branch, where I had my fixed deposits, was burnt down by the terrorists. My F. D. account for lack of bank records had become inoperative.

My daughter had come to Jammu from Karnataka for her short summer holidays & her annual fees & out of pocket expenses had to be funded & paid for before she went back. Realising my financial constraints Surinder, one day, came home with money & asked me to keep & return it whenever I felt comfortable. I thanked him for his love & understanding but returned his money. This incident brought us & our two families even more close in the coming years.

Incidentally, during this difficult period my wife Vasanta stood solidly behind me & counselled me against borrowing or taking money from anyone including my parents. She assured me that the two us, given our moral strength, will definitely see through this crisis. She was O. K. living with our falling lifestyle & living standards, but not willing to make any compromise on our moral values & family honour.

The general office & social environment was becoming polarised on communal lines. The going was getting worse and tough, all in all a very depressing situation for upright people with dignity and honour. I was feeling very suffocated in this changed & communally- surcharged scenario. I thus broadly started harbouring thoughts of resigning from my job & moving out of the State.

I came to Srinagar only in 1968-69 & my knowledge of Kashmiri language, rituals, customs & interface with Muslims was very rudimentary. It had taken me a lot of time to adjust in the new surroundings & make a mark for myself despite strong communal bias in the state machinery set up & society.

The value system that I had inherited & was comfortable living with was at total variance & in conflict with the value system of the people or society that I had tried very hard to integrate with.

The emerging social & political scene in the Valley had amply signalled that the Jihadi Muslim leadership was out to destroy the communal peace, commonly shared values & beliefs of Kashmiris. The Kashmiri Hindus were not wanted or welcome in the Valley any more. Jihadi leadership was very confident of seeing in a few months' time the Kashmir Valley become a part of Pakistan.

This situation coupled with the total ineptitude of the Government of India in handling or tackling the jihadi elements head on thus forced me to do a rethink on my continuance in the state. On my rational & honest evaluation, I eventually came to the conclusion that I did not belong here & it was time for me to move on in life.

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Courtesy:- Sushil Kumar Kaul, and December 2022 Koshur Samachar