[Reader-list] Mark by Words by Arvind Gigoo(in GK)

[rashneek kher]

*Letter to Kashmiri Muslims and Kashmiri Pandits

MUSINGS BY ARVIND GIGOO*

 My dear Kashmiri Muslims

Right from 1947 your leaders and politicians lied to you, confused you and
exploited you.  The crafty politicians used you for their selfish ends and
the Indian leadership took you for granted. Pakistan played upon your
religious sentiments. Then some other countries started playing their own
games with you. When George Bush condemned Muslim terrorism you turned sad.
When Obama praised Muslims you were happy. When Pakistan mentions  Kashmir
you feel elated.

You are a gullible lot. You believe in false promises. Nobody trusts you.
Your tragedy is the result of the politicking of your leaders and of those
you consider your well-wishers.

Kashmir is an issue of betrayal, blunder, falsehood and mistrust. It is a
confusing admixture of plebiscite, Pakistan, India(?), independence and
ambiguous ideas and theories. Once it was jana gana mana; then it was
nizam-e-mustafa. You turned so naïve that you thought azadi was a question
of some days. Now things have degenerated into something you have no control
over.

In the last twenty years you lost hundreds of thousands of people__ young
boys, men, women and children. You lost your humanism and your cultural
ethos. You lost Pandits. You are living in lies. You are a victim of
depression, repentance, sorrow and defeat.

Pakistanis have a very poor opinion of you. Indians don’t trust you at all.
Your leaders don’t care for you.

Militants, double agents, suspects, informants, spies, looters, freebooters
and con men thrive in Kashmir. Nobody knows who is doing what. You suffer
from political and societal schizophrenia and civilizational  dementia.

You have lost your freedom of speech. The cunning among you talk one thing
in private and change their stance in public. Some have chosen silence, and
silence, during a period of  political unrest, is dangerous. Political
blackmailers, extortionists, security forces and greedy opportunists have
devastated you. Now you are insensitive to your own suffering and to the
suffering of your own people. Rumours and farcical slogans have placed you
in a quagmire of directionless aspiration, purposelessness and psychological
trauma. You have yet to fix your goal.

Your educated youth have intellect, vision and dreams. But unemployment,
uncertainty and lack of opportunity have frustrated them. How long will they
and you go on waiting for the outcome of ‘meaningful and composite
dialogue’?
Answer your own questions. Question your leaders, politicians and think
tank. Everything is in your hands. Shifting loyalties and short term plans
will lead you nowhere. For sixty-three years your leaders did nothing for
you. Pursue only one goal. Politics of doubletalk is bound to fail. And
remember what Lancelot Hogben has said: ‘ No society is safe in the hands of
its clever people.’

Letter to  Pandits 100 Years Hence
(Read this letter on 19 January, 2110)
My dear Descendants,
You are rootless. You belong to no place. You are nowhere. The base of your
life is a vacuum. The language you speak is not your own. Your festivals are
borrowed. You live by proxy. You are half-machine. The rain and the snow you
enjoy are artificial. Machines and robots wait upon your parents. You buy
the organs of the body from the departmental stores. You are unaware of your
children. You visit other planets. There is a place called Kashmir on this
planet. Fly to that place and find your scattered selves there. Your life is
uselessly long. What is your religion? You don’t know. What do you believe
in? You don’t know. You are lost in this world peopled with cold and callous
half-humans. You have no love and compassion. You don’t celebrate memory
because you have none. Your life is some digits and speed. What are you up
to? What do you want? You will never know. You are unpersons.

(Arvind Gigoo, a retired professor of English, is the author of
The Ugly  Kashmiri. Feedback at arvindgigoo00 at gmail.com

-- 
Rashneek Kher
http://www.kashmiris-in-exile.blogspot.com
http://www.nietzschereborn.blogspot.com