Kashimiri life behind the headlines
Tempo English(No.1716), Dec. 5, 2016 (Srinagar)
Tempo English(No.1716), Dec. 5, 2016 (Srinagar)
Lal Chowk, at the heart of Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir State, seemed deserted on Friday, October 28.
With the notorious Kashmir winter around the corner, Lal Chowk should have been teeming with people shopping for winter necessities after Friday prayer.
But all the shops were closed in the majority Muslim town. Instead, there was a heavy military presence on the streets and only a handful of men were seen circumventing the barbed wires by the landmark clock tower ‘Ganta Ghar’.
“We are closed in because we want freedom,” said Adul Majid, owner of a 38-year-old small grocery shop in Lal Chowk. Along with other shops at Lal Chowk, Majid’s shop has witnessed various armed confrontations and survived natural disasters, such as the massive 2014 floods.
While the shutting down of shops was voluntary, the closure of three major mosques in Srinagar and the mobile internet service was ordered by the State to prevent massive street protests.
The iconic Jamia Mosque has been closed the past 15 weeks and every Friday morning, according to news reports, there is heavy security around the mosque, further isolated by the absence of a 3G/4G communications network in the Kashmir Valley.
In front of the half-opened shutter of his shop in Lal Chowk, Majid told us how the Kashmiris have suffered because of their desire for a referendum ever since India occupied the Kashmir Valley in 1947.
For many Kashmiris, 1947—the year then-ruler Hari Singh ceded Jammu and Kashmir to India—was a black year.
The ‘India accession’ day, on October 26 that year, was followed by a people’s uprising, the 1948 UN Security Council resolution on the Kashmir conflict, the 1989 armed struggle, the 1999 Kargil war and numerous violent as well as peaceful protests during the 2008-2010 period. Tensions remain high even today.
Some 100,000 Kashmiris have been killed and 10,000 have disappeared since Indian security forces occupied the valley following the 1989 insurgency.
Since 1947, casualties and forced disappearances have reportedly reached 600,000 in the Kashmir Valley, as told by many Kashmiris living major towns as well as remote villages in the central and north Kashmir Valley from October 24 to 29, during Tempo’s visit.
“We decided to open our shops only three days a week after 5pm, following the Hurriyat calendar, to protest against Indian brutality,”said Majid.
‘Hurriyat’ is a shorthand for the joint resistance leaders of Kashmiri independence, the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, formed in 1993, which releases a weekly protest calendar.
Exceptions to following the protest calendar include pharmacies and hospitals for emergency, street vendors selling vegetables and fruits, bakeries and autorickshaws for basic day-to-day needs.
The silent collective strike by ordinary Kashmiris in the past two months spread around Kashmir Valley from the southern region, where a young Hizbul Mujahideen commander was killed.
On July 8, 21-year-old pro-freedom militant commander Burhan Muzaffar Wani, who became a phenomenon with his social media outreach against Indian occupation in Kashmir, was killed by Indian security forces.
The official curfew, including the ban on telecommunication services in the valley, was declared by the state government right after the incident, to curb the massive outcry in the valley. The ban lasted until August 31.
But even after the end of the official curfew, people refused to reopen their shops, businesses and schools, demanding that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi begin talks on a Kashmir referendum as recommended by the UN Security Council resolution.
The ‘East Timor model’ and ‘Brexit’ are the examples raised by pro-freedom supporters in the Kashmir Valley.
“These are people mourning Burhan’s death by closing their shops. And this type of long protest has never happened in Kashmir history. It’s new and unprecedented because Kashmiris usually don’t react to the death of a political leader or militant,” says Sheikh Showkat Hussain, an international law professor at the Central University of Kashmir.
There was two aspects to life in Kashmir Valley in the last week of October. In contrast to the deserted daytime, shops open and streets bustle at night time.
The Hurriyat calendar is voluntarily followed even by people in the remote villages of North Kashmir, close to the Line of Control (LOC), namely Handwara, Haril, Lach, Wagat, Vilgam, Kral Pora, Trehgam, Shirhama, and Kupwara.
From 5pm to 9 pm, crowds and traffic jams revisit Srinagar’s major commerce areas, including Lal Chowk, Regal Chowk and Dal Gate.
Near sunset, at 6pm last Monday, October 24, Password bookshop, one of the thriving publications businesses in Regal Chowk, witnessed a bustling evening crowd.
Curfewed Night (2008), the famous book on Kashmiri life under heavy Indian militarization, and Do You Remember Kunan Poshpora? (2013), another book on the Indian army’s 1991 systematic rape of Kashmiri women in the villages of Kunan and Poshpora, North Kashmir, are gaining fresh attention from younger Kashmiri readers under curfew and strike this year.
At around 6am on Saturday, October 29, Kashmiri men on their long wooden shikara boats, opened the day by selling their vegetables from the floating gardens in the famous tourist destination, the Dal Lake in Srinagar.
Round-shaped white radishes, cauliflowers, spinach, cucumbers, potatoes, and tomatoes are the October harvest of Dal Lake and the main source of income for the area’s residents.
Haji Abdul Aziz piled radishes in his empty Shikara to sell later in the evening at the Batmaloo Jehloom market in old Srinagar.
The 60-year-old nodded his head, making strong eye contact, when asked whether he supported the Hurriyat.
His stern facial expression, under his flowing white beard, was a testament of the Kashmiris’ unquestionable support for the pro-freedom movement today.
“In a conflict zone like Kashmir, there are two kinds of power, one that has authority and another that has legitimacy. And the Hurriyat is certainly a legitimate front representing people’s pro-independence aspiration in Kashmir,” explained Masood Hussain, editor in chief of the local English weekly Kashmir Life.
Another Urdu language local journalist even referred the Hurriyat as the ‘emotional government of Kashmiri people today’.
Nevertheless, one Hurriyat leader, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, is unsure about the leadership role the Hurriyat can play beyond being a protest calendar, particularly in context with the conflict between the Kashmiri aspiration for independence and India’s territorial authority.
The present state of the Kashmiri conflict makes it difficult to politically break out of the current stalemate.
The Indian government views the conflict as a design of Pakistani terrorists and a security threat rather than a basic issue of human rights and freedom for the Kashmiris.
But activists here remain in high spirits, in spite of the national isolation and international disregard, with the only support coming from Pakistan and China.
“Jammu and Kashmir is the only state in India that can elicit real pressure on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government. We believe this is what we have achieved over the last four months of protests,” said Ala Fazli, student leader and a pharmaceutical Ph.D candidate at the University of Kashmir.
With the notorious Kashmir winter around the corner, Lal Chowk should have been teeming with people shopping for winter necessities after Friday prayer.
But all the shops were closed in the majority Muslim town. Instead, there was a heavy military presence on the streets and only a handful of men were seen circumventing the barbed wires by the landmark clock tower ‘Ganta Ghar’.
“We are closed in because we want freedom,” said Adul Majid, owner of a 38-year-old small grocery shop in Lal Chowk. Along with other shops at Lal Chowk, Majid’s shop has witnessed various armed confrontations and survived natural disasters, such as the massive 2014 floods.
While the shutting down of shops was voluntary, the closure of three major mosques in Srinagar and the mobile internet service was ordered by the State to prevent massive street protests.
The iconic Jamia Mosque has been closed the past 15 weeks and every Friday morning, according to news reports, there is heavy security around the mosque, further isolated by the absence of a 3G/4G communications network in the Kashmir Valley.
In front of the half-opened shutter of his shop in Lal Chowk, Majid told us how the Kashmiris have suffered because of their desire for a referendum ever since India occupied the Kashmir Valley in 1947.
For many Kashmiris, 1947—the year then-ruler Hari Singh ceded Jammu and Kashmir to India—was a black year.
The ‘India accession’ day, on October 26 that year, was followed by a people’s uprising, the 1948 UN Security Council resolution on the Kashmir conflict, the 1989 armed struggle, the 1999 Kargil war and numerous violent as well as peaceful protests during the 2008-2010 period. Tensions remain high even today.
Some 100,000 Kashmiris have been killed and 10,000 have disappeared since Indian security forces occupied the valley following the 1989 insurgency.
Since 1947, casualties and forced disappearances have reportedly reached 600,000 in the Kashmir Valley, as told by many Kashmiris living major towns as well as remote villages in the central and north Kashmir Valley from October 24 to 29, during Tempo’s visit.
“We decided to open our shops only three days a week after 5pm, following the Hurriyat calendar, to protest against Indian brutality,”said Majid.
‘Hurriyat’ is a shorthand for the joint resistance leaders of Kashmiri independence, the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, formed in 1993, which releases a weekly protest calendar.
Exceptions to following the protest calendar include pharmacies and hospitals for emergency, street vendors selling vegetables and fruits, bakeries and autorickshaws for basic day-to-day needs.
The silent collective strike by ordinary Kashmiris in the past two months spread around Kashmir Valley from the southern region, where a young Hizbul Mujahideen commander was killed.
On July 8, 21-year-old pro-freedom militant commander Burhan Muzaffar Wani, who became a phenomenon with his social media outreach against Indian occupation in Kashmir, was killed by Indian security forces.
The official curfew, including the ban on telecommunication services in the valley, was declared by the state government right after the incident, to curb the massive outcry in the valley. The ban lasted until August 31.
But even after the end of the official curfew, people refused to reopen their shops, businesses and schools, demanding that Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi begin talks on a Kashmir referendum as recommended by the UN Security Council resolution.
The ‘East Timor model’ and ‘Brexit’ are the examples raised by pro-freedom supporters in the Kashmir Valley.
“These are people mourning Burhan’s death by closing their shops. And this type of long protest has never happened in Kashmir history. It’s new and unprecedented because Kashmiris usually don’t react to the death of a political leader or militant,” says Sheikh Showkat Hussain, an international law professor at the Central University of Kashmir.
There was two aspects to life in Kashmir Valley in the last week of October. In contrast to the deserted daytime, shops open and streets bustle at night time.
The Hurriyat calendar is voluntarily followed even by people in the remote villages of North Kashmir, close to the Line of Control (LOC), namely Handwara, Haril, Lach, Wagat, Vilgam, Kral Pora, Trehgam, Shirhama, and Kupwara.
From 5pm to 9 pm, crowds and traffic jams revisit Srinagar’s major commerce areas, including Lal Chowk, Regal Chowk and Dal Gate.
Near sunset, at 6pm last Monday, October 24, Password bookshop, one of the thriving publications businesses in Regal Chowk, witnessed a bustling evening crowd.
Curfewed Night (2008), the famous book on Kashmiri life under heavy Indian militarization, and Do You Remember Kunan Poshpora? (2013), another book on the Indian army’s 1991 systematic rape of Kashmiri women in the villages of Kunan and Poshpora, North Kashmir, are gaining fresh attention from younger Kashmiri readers under curfew and strike this year.
At around 6am on Saturday, October 29, Kashmiri men on their long wooden shikara boats, opened the day by selling their vegetables from the floating gardens in the famous tourist destination, the Dal Lake in Srinagar.
Round-shaped white radishes, cauliflowers, spinach, cucumbers, potatoes, and tomatoes are the October harvest of Dal Lake and the main source of income for the area’s residents.
Haji Abdul Aziz piled radishes in his empty Shikara to sell later in the evening at the Batmaloo Jehloom market in old Srinagar.
The 60-year-old nodded his head, making strong eye contact, when asked whether he supported the Hurriyat.
His stern facial expression, under his flowing white beard, was a testament of the Kashmiris’ unquestionable support for the pro-freedom movement today.
“In a conflict zone like Kashmir, there are two kinds of power, one that has authority and another that has legitimacy. And the Hurriyat is certainly a legitimate front representing people’s pro-independence aspiration in Kashmir,” explained Masood Hussain, editor in chief of the local English weekly Kashmir Life.
Another Urdu language local journalist even referred the Hurriyat as the ‘emotional government of Kashmiri people today’.
Nevertheless, one Hurriyat leader, Syed Ali Shah Geelani, is unsure about the leadership role the Hurriyat can play beyond being a protest calendar, particularly in context with the conflict between the Kashmiri aspiration for independence and India’s territorial authority.
The present state of the Kashmiri conflict makes it difficult to politically break out of the current stalemate.
The Indian government views the conflict as a design of Pakistani terrorists and a security threat rather than a basic issue of human rights and freedom for the Kashmiris.
But activists here remain in high spirits, in spite of the national isolation and international disregard, with the only support coming from Pakistan and China.
“Jammu and Kashmir is the only state in India that can elicit real pressure on the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government. We believe this is what we have achieved over the last four months of protests,” said Ala Fazli, student leader and a pharmaceutical Ph.D candidate at the University of Kashmir.