[Reader-list] What Kashmiris Want

Sun Aug 8 09:22:13 IST 2010

By Sonia Jabbar

Published in Hindustan Times as They the People.¹
Aug 8, 2010

In 2006, my friend Amin Bhatt and I were talking at a Srinagar café.  When
I look at kids who are in their early 20s who have seen no other Kashmir but
this, I wonder whether it¹s extraordinary patience or something that is
smoldering inside, rage that is quietly being nursed,¹ he said. Today, when
Kashmir burns, when teenagers confront armed security forces with stones,
when 45 men and women have been shot or beaten to death in violent
demonstrations since June 11, I can¹t help remember his words.

Amin Bhatt is not a prophet, nor a separatist whose popularity rises with
the death toll of Kashmiri civilians.  He is a playwright and a theatre
director. He is also a man whose younger brother was beaten to death in
Baramulla in December 2005 when a grenade lobbed at an army convoy missed
its target, provoking the soldiers into attacking bystanders.   Far from the
soldiers being punished, the army insisted Amin¹s brother was a militant
involved in the attack.  Amin¹s response was to write more scripts and
direct plays that opened to packed audiences in Baramulla and in Srinagar.
He may well have picked up a stone.

Bakhti is an illiterate old widow in Tragpora, a village just north of
Sopore who has for the past decade fought the Indian state in Srinagar¹s
courts.  Her son, Manzoor Ahmed Wani was a victim of a love-feud that
resulted in his enforced disappearance. The police tracked down the hired
killer, Tantray, a surrendered militant who worked with the army and Major
Bhattacharya of the 28 Rashtriya Rifles (RR).  But the Kashmiri was the only
one to be arrested, tried and convicted, while Major Bhattacharya was
hurriedly transferred out of Kashmir.  Bakhti still tucks a thick file under
her arm and travels to Srinagar once a month to seek justice.  I suspect she
knows the score because when I asked how I could help, she was very clear.
I don¹t want compensation or jobs for my other children.  Please just ask
them to show me where they dumped his body so that I can hold my child¹s
bones to my breast one last time.¹

In March 2000 soon after the infamous massacre of Sikhs of Chittisinghpora,
the 7 RR picked up Mohammad Yusuf Malik, a sheep trader and 4 others, passed
them off as militants and murdered them in cold blood for cash rewards.
Post mortem reports of the exhumed bodies showed that 2 had died of bullet
wounds, 2 had 50-60% burns plus bullet wounds and one was burned to death.
In Halan I faced his distraught 12-year old son.  They murdered my father,¹
he said, fighting back the tears.
My heart contracted.  I know,¹ I reached out to stroke his head. No!¹ he
brushed my hand aside, You don¹t know anything!  We got his body, but his
body had no head.¹ 

I left Halan fearing for the little boy, how would he ever forget this
nightmare, how would his scars ever heal?  If we were in the west there
would be trauma centers and shrinks to counsel him and then when he grew up
if he still picked up a gun and ran amok at a Mc Donalds, everyone would
point understandingly at his traumatized childhood.  And yet, when it comes
to Kashmir even senior politicians wonder what  it is they¹ want?

Since June 11, the state has done little to soothe the hurt and anger.  Each
death has resulted in a fresh wave of street violence.  Contrary to the
understanding of the Home Ministry this is very simply the eruption of a
cauldron that has long been simmering. There have been close to 80 civilian
killings since Omar Abdullah took over as Chief Minister in January 2009.
And each time the Valley erupts in protests the entire political edifice
collapses.  Ministers, MLAs, district level politicians, halqa presidents,
and party workers vanish without a trace. Far from being out in their
constituencies listening to the problems of people, consoling the families
of the dead, providing succor to the wounded, the entire political class
cowers in their fortress homes, and this includes the so-called separatists.

Despite the successful legislative elections of 2002 and 2008 power has not
trickled to the grass-root level.  Panchayat elections are yet to happen in
Kashmir. In this political vacuum all power is abdicated to the security
forces, who have trained for the past 20 years to define the problem only in
terms of law and order.  It is no surprise that casualties are high.  The
mob is fierce, the police is understaffed, overworked and stressed.  80% of
the J&K Police is used for security of politicians, who often demand greater
numbers to boost their status.  The remaining 20% that man police stations
do not have the equipment nor the training to deal with angry mobs that
number thousands.  

What is granted under fear can be retained only so long as the fear lasts,¹
wrote Gandhi prophetically in Hind Swaraj. With Kashmiri youth losing fear
of the might of the Indian state, New Delhi is fast running out of options.
Perhaps the Prime Minister would find some answers if he went to Tragpora
and listened to an old widow.