Yusuf narrates the harrowing experience of a tourist group wishing to explore Gurez and implores J&K Government not to promote tourism in frontier locations without adequate infrastructure and courtesy staff
(Mr. Mohammad Yusuf, 57, was born in the Dalgate area of Srinagar. He attended Government Schools in Drugjan, Sonawar, and Batwara, all in Srinagar, and completed his college studies at the Sri Partap College, Srinagar. Following his graduation, he briefly attended the University of Kashmir, and in 1980, joined the Physical Education Department of the University of Kashmir. Mr. Yusuf taught aquatics and adventure sports (swimming, mountaineering, snow and water skiing, rafting, parasailing, skating, kayaking, canoeing, etc.), before retiring in 2011. His students have has won many local sports trophies. He has led many exploration expeditions in Kashmir, and has been the Treasurer of the Winter Sports Association of Jammu and Kashmir, General Secretary of J&K Aero Sports Association and the J&K Ski & Mountaineering Association, Secretary of Srinagar Winter Sports Association, and Vice President of the J&K Yoga Association. He presently works as a consultant at the Adventure Call Tours and Travels. In his leisure time, Mr. Yusuf engages in social work, gardening and blogging.)
Shape it First
Much has been discussed and written about the potential of tourism in the Dard-Shina tribe dominated Gurez valley for long. The articles written by this author and Mr. Zahid Samoon etc. earlier also highlighted the potential of tourism in Gurez. With the motive to develop Gurez as a potential tourism destination the Tourism Department is regularly conducting the Tourism festivals in this remote valley for many years now. Pertinently the first well organized and research based exploratory expedition to Gurez was undertaken by the Directorate of Physical Education and Sports, University of Kashmir way back in 2005. The historic expedition, consisting of 60 students of different colleges and post-graduate departments of the University and three TV channels, brought Gurez into the notice of the authorities and other tourism players. It is in fact cherished desire of the local MLA, Jenab Nazir Ahmad Khan (Gurezi) to put Gurez on international tourism map. Many other well-wishers of Gurez are contributing their bit to this direction.
Since there are not standard hotels or huts available in Gurez at the moment, the Tourism Department has constructed Tourist Reception Centre there with residential accommodation of 5 double bed rooms and some well-furnished log houses. There are some other Guest Houses of different departments like Fisheries, Forests and PWD etc. but a common tourist is not allowed to stay in these bungalows. The newly constructed buildings of Tourism Department have made it possible for tourists to visit Gurez.
After putting hard efforts by Kashmir University, Tourism Department, writers and locals, Gurez is being recognized as a total destination for heritage, herbal and adventure tourism in the country. Surprisingly the domestic tourists have now started planning visit this formidable Himalayan valley. Tour operators are also now giving it space in their itineraries. Gurez has tremendous potential for adventure and recreation tourism. Its challenging, majestic and lofty snow clad mountains towards Mushko valley offer great challenge for serious climbing, the hills and the pastures are ideal for bushwalking, hiking and trekking, while the smooth and virgin slopes are ideal for alpine snow skiing and paragliding. In the plain area of the valley one can also operate parasailing and during winter ski-touring could be great fun here. River Kishenganga is ideal for white water rafting, kayaking and sport angling. The rich Dard-Shina culture and the heritage log houses are yet another attraction for tourists. The rich flora and fauna is ideal for nature lovers.
The tourism in Gurez is presently formless and needs to be shaped first by the Government and thereafter recommend the tourists to visit it. Surprisingly on 29th May, 2011 a Kolkata based ‘MYNATURECLUB’ team, led by Mr. P.P. Ghosh, consisting of 17 members including 6 ladies and 5 children, left Srinagar for Dawar early in the morning. As per rules they approached the Police Station at Bandipora for acquiring the required movement pass but were told that the passes are issued in the S.P’s office. To our dismay when the team called on the S.P’s office they found just one officer available there and all other subordinate staff was enjoying holiday. There was no one to issue them the necessary passes. They were then told to come next day. Since the group had planned just two nights stay in Gurez it was not possible for them to retreat. Due to overflow of tourists at Srinagar it was not possible for them to arrange accommodation in any hotel at Srinagar. There was no alternative but to proceed towards Dawar under any circumstances. On hearing the misery faced by the team at Bandipora, the Tour Coordinator in Srinagar approached the concerned officials in Tourism Department and a political activist from Dawar for extending their help to the stranded team. But astonishingly no one could help them out till 5.00 p.m. He then approached the President, Travel Agents Association of Kashmir (TAAK), Mr. Rauf Ahmad Tramboo, who tried to contact the Minister for Tourism, Mr. Nawang Rigzon Jora but to the bad luck of the group, Mr. Jora’s cell was switched off as he was busy in inaugurating the Golf Course at Pahalgam. It was now about 6 o’clock when Mr. Rauf succeeded in contacting the Minister of State for Home and Tourism, Mr. Nasir Aslam Wani, who was kind enough to take immediate action and directed the Police officer in Bandipora to issue the necessary pass to the group. By then it was 6.30 pm and it was about to go dark. Due to fear the senior members of the team were showing reluctance to travel in rough mountainous terrain during night. Not only tourists but the drivers were also scared of traveling on the unseen road in the dead of the night. After great deal the team was finally motivated to move forward under any circumstances. The disgusted team finally left Bandipora for Dawar at 7.00 p.m.
One wonders why the police did not issue the pass to the group before receiving a telephone call from the Minister. The travel from Bandipora to Dawar normally takes 4 to 4.30 hours in fair weather but since the drivers were travelling on this road for the first time it took them about 6 hours. To the safety of the team the drivers drove their vehicles very carefully in the darkness.
The efforts made by the caretaker of TRC building at Dawar, Mr. Ghulam Muhammad Lone, in making this unique trip a success deserves high applauds. He was anxiously waiting for the group on roadside with torch in his hand up to 1.00 am. He had already arranged dinner for them. Mr. Ghulam Muhammad has always been in the forefront whenever there was any move towards the promotion of tourism in Gurez.
On return from Gurez Mr. Ghosh expressed that “What a disparity? The men from the valley – be it Yusuf Sahib, or the two Zahoors, or Jenab Gulam M. Lone – all of them helped us a lot to put us across the Valley to the unexplored Gurez Sector. On the other side the JKP, RR, CRPF, BSF men from down the valley, only put before us queries that made us uncomfortable, unnerved and unknown in our own land. Totally enamored by the trouble Yusuf took in convincing the Police Department of Bandipore in providing us with the permission. I thought the movement pass could have been arranged a bit earlier if we could apprehend such horrifying impasse created by the police procedure”. He further expressed that “It was a true and touching moment when I saw Jenab Gulam M. Lone standing on the entry point of Dawar with a torch at such late hours – 1 AM of the night. No words to express my gratitude to this elderly gentleman of Gurez. His team was wonderful. Always trying to help us and make us feel comfortable”.
If the tourism in Gurez is to be promoted seriously the authorities at the helm have to play their role in a coordinated manner. It is suggested that instead of issuing the travel permissions at Bandipora these must be issued at TRC Srinagar through Dy. Director (Enforcement) as is done in the case of Air-Port permissions. The Tourism Department must arrange fame tours for local tourism players, guides and commercial vehicle drivers to acquaint them to the facilities, terrain and the road conditions of the area. It was a difficult task to motivate the two tempo traveller drivers of same name, Zahoor, to take a trip to Gurez and Telail. It was their maiden trip to this hitherto unknown tourist destination.
Besides holding the tourism festival, Gurez needs lot more publicity to grow its tourism potential. Conducting of adventure sports programs for the local youth is also important because without training manpower it may not be possible to operate adventure tourism smoothly there. It was a good move to shift some ski gear from Gulmarg to Dawar last year but conducting the training camps in skiing, rafting, trekking and climbing is equally important.
Friday, June 17, 2011
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Gross Deficiencies in Healthcare in Kashmir
Sarosh succinctly highlights urgent needs in the healthcare in Kashmir in an editorial in the Physicians Academy June 2011 edition
(Dr. Sarosh Ahmed Khan, MD, 48, was born in Srinagar. He pursued his initial schooling from the Victoria High School in Bombay (now called Mumbai), and matriculated from the New Era Public School in Srinagar. He completed his pre-medical college degree from the Sri Pratap College, Srinagar, and received his medical degrees (MBBS, MD) from the Government Medical College (GMC), Srinagar. He is a senior consulting physician st the Modern Hospital in Rajbagh, Srinagar. Dr. Khan is the editor-in-chief of the Physicians Academy, an online medical journal, and the Vice President of the Kashmir Academy of Private Physicians. He is actively involved with the "Chotay Taray" Foundation dedicated to educating mentally and physically challenging children. Dr. Khan in his leisure time enjoys cricket, internet and music.)
(Dr. Sarosh Ahmed Khan, MD, 48, was born in Srinagar. He pursued his initial schooling from the Victoria High School in Bombay (now called Mumbai), and matriculated from the New Era Public School in Srinagar. He completed his pre-medical college degree from the Sri Pratap College, Srinagar, and received his medical degrees (MBBS, MD) from the Government Medical College (GMC), Srinagar. He is a senior consulting physician st the Modern Hospital in Rajbagh, Srinagar. Dr. Khan is the editor-in-chief of the Physicians Academy, an online medical journal, and the Vice President of the Kashmir Academy of Private Physicians. He is actively involved with the "Chotay Taray" Foundation dedicated to educating mentally and physically challenging children. Dr. Khan in his leisure time enjoys cricket, internet and music.)
Need to Improve Healthcare in Kashmir
Healthcare in Kashmir has not been in a healthy state for a long time now. The
expectations of the common man have not been met. Suggestions by doctors in general
and recommendations by expert committees in particular have gone waste. But we have
not lost hope. The tourists are visiting Kashmir in millions every year and we have to have excellent healthcare services to offer. If this helps the government to understand the problem, so be it! We are here presenting some of the long term measures which would transform healthcare in Kashmir.
The need for maternity hospital in all districts of Kashmir:
The need of the hour and a need for years to come is an “Lal Ded (LD) hospital” in all districts of Kashmir. There are innumerable examples of precious lives lost during and after delivery. The patient load in LD Hospital of Srinagar is bound to become less if this happens. More importantly patient care will drastically improve.
The need for a Pediatric Hospital in all districts of Kashmir:
Needlessly to say we do not have a children’s hospital here in Kashmir. The one in GB
Pant hospital is as bad as a jail (it was indeed used by the military for their own
purposes and even today belongs to them). There is no ventilation there and on an
average 7-8 deaths occur on a daily basis in this hospital. Most of these deaths are
preventable in a place like Delhi or Mumbai.
The need for a Trauma Center in Srinagar and on the National highway:
Road traffic accidents have become very common in Kashmir. Violence otherwise too has
consumed thousands of precious lives here in the valley. Unfortunately there has been
no plan in the last two decades to start a full fledged Trauma Hospital here. It would indeed be needed more in the future considering the number of vehicles on the roads and the increasing number of accidents that take place daily.
The need for Ambulances for catering to Emergencies:
If we want to move ahead in development of healthcare, then a state-of-the-art
ambulance service has to be thought of and started as soon as possible. It should be just a call away and should be able to provide emergency care including BLS and ALS. There are lots of young doctors who are jobless and they would be more than ready to work.
The need to prevent sale of spurious medicines:
Kashmir has become a haven for companies producing spurious medicines. There is no
check on this menace and the patients suffer. Screening the medicines which enter
Kashmir is a must and the government has to act fast and on a long term basis.
The need to prevent unlicensed practitioners from practicing medicine:
After compounders, RMPs, Unanis and Ayurveds, now even the acupuncturists have the
guts to prescribe allopathic medicines. No one from the government (the officials of the Health Department, the Municipal Committee and the higher administration) seems to have any idea what is happening in the open. All this is to be stopped if we have to improve healthcare in Kashmir.
Healthcare in Kashmir has not been in a healthy state for a long time now. The
expectations of the common man have not been met. Suggestions by doctors in general
and recommendations by expert committees in particular have gone waste. But we have
not lost hope. The tourists are visiting Kashmir in millions every year and we have to have excellent healthcare services to offer. If this helps the government to understand the problem, so be it! We are here presenting some of the long term measures which would transform healthcare in Kashmir.
The need for maternity hospital in all districts of Kashmir:
The need of the hour and a need for years to come is an “Lal Ded (LD) hospital” in all districts of Kashmir. There are innumerable examples of precious lives lost during and after delivery. The patient load in LD Hospital of Srinagar is bound to become less if this happens. More importantly patient care will drastically improve.
The need for a Pediatric Hospital in all districts of Kashmir:
Needlessly to say we do not have a children’s hospital here in Kashmir. The one in GB
Pant hospital is as bad as a jail (it was indeed used by the military for their own
purposes and even today belongs to them). There is no ventilation there and on an
average 7-8 deaths occur on a daily basis in this hospital. Most of these deaths are
preventable in a place like Delhi or Mumbai.
The need for a Trauma Center in Srinagar and on the National highway:
Road traffic accidents have become very common in Kashmir. Violence otherwise too has
consumed thousands of precious lives here in the valley. Unfortunately there has been
no plan in the last two decades to start a full fledged Trauma Hospital here. It would indeed be needed more in the future considering the number of vehicles on the roads and the increasing number of accidents that take place daily.
The need for Ambulances for catering to Emergencies:
If we want to move ahead in development of healthcare, then a state-of-the-art
ambulance service has to be thought of and started as soon as possible. It should be just a call away and should be able to provide emergency care including BLS and ALS. There are lots of young doctors who are jobless and they would be more than ready to work.
The need to prevent sale of spurious medicines:
Kashmir has become a haven for companies producing spurious medicines. There is no
check on this menace and the patients suffer. Screening the medicines which enter
Kashmir is a must and the government has to act fast and on a long term basis.
The need to prevent unlicensed practitioners from practicing medicine:
After compounders, RMPs, Unanis and Ayurveds, now even the acupuncturists have the
guts to prescribe allopathic medicines. No one from the government (the officials of the Health Department, the Municipal Committee and the higher administration) seems to have any idea what is happening in the open. All this is to be stopped if we have to improve healthcare in Kashmir.
Friday, June 3, 2011
The Art of Weaving Native Kashmiri Floor Mats
Iqbal looks at the art of making of traditional flooring in Kashmir which is fast disappearing
(Mr. Iqbal Ahmad, 49, was born in Parigam Chek, Kulgam. He is a graduate with Diploma in Numismatics, Archaeology and Heritage. He is an archaeologist, writer, and a cultural historian. He is employed by the Jammu and Kashmir State Government. Mr. Iqbal Ahmad has published 12 reference books on Kashmir archaeology and heritage.)
Preserving the Art of Gabba Sazi
Among the traditional matting’s of Kashmir, mention may be made of Patej, Wagu, and Gabba (local names for different kinds of floor matting). These types had once been very common and popular among the rural as well as the urban households. As the tradition had it, the Kashmiri women first used to plaster their room floors by a thin layer of clay mixtures and after drying, these floors were covered upon by the Patej and Wagu mats, which were made of straw and pechi. Usually the rural matting mostly consisted of the mats prepared of the straw, called Patej, while as the urban people had no access to the paddy straw so they would prefer the Wagu matting prepared of pechi which used to grow in the wetlands in outskirts of the city. This type of matting was not easy to make as it required a great deal of expertise to shape up a mat out of its constituents.
As the time passed by, this type of mat- making took the shape of Kashmiri art and a section of people adopted it as their profession. The wagu makers gradually took their product to the rural Kashmir and established their markets in villages.
Initially this type of flooring was introduced in village mosques, Khanqahas and Sufi shrines. Likewise rural artisans expanded their market of Patej to urban areas. Such types of matting was most common and every Kashmiri family could afford it easily. In addition to these cheap mattings, we had a tradition of expensive and most magnificent mats called Gabba.
Gabba mats were made of wool and embroidered skillfully with different colorful designs. This matting was very expensive and only well-to-do families could afford it. These mats were put over the straw mats. The ordinary families used such mattings only on special occasions and functions. Although, the tradition of these mats has almost vanished from Kashmiri households, but Gabba is still seen around, though not so commonly.
A Gabba is a unique type of floor covering prepared from old woolen blankets called ‘Chaeder’. It is made in a variety of forms and designs. The three major types of the Gabba are Appliqué or Dalgulaar with a circular star in the middle called Chand, embroidery and printed.
The Applique type of Gabba is con¬sidered of a high quality. In this form same coloured pieces of woolen blanket are brought together and embroidered on joints, which makes beautiful designs mostly of sun and moon. This type of Gabba is said to be the proto-type of Jamawar, where miniature needles were applied in bringing separately-embroidered pieces to¬gether. The embroidered ones are very common while as printed Gabba are merely the imitations of embroidered ones available at very cheap rates. The earlier types of appliqué designs have almost dis-appeared. One such piece called Mughal type Gabba is preserved in the textile gallery of the State Museum at Srinagar. The other types are common and produced in several localities of Anantnag.
Like other arts, Gabba Sazi is considered a very old art of Kashmir. Scholars have iden-tified bronze figure of Buddha dated to 6th century AD shown seated on such a floor cover which, according to them, resembles with a Gabba. On several olden paintings, the floor covers had been shown consisting of Kashmiri Gabba. To the late period, one Kabuli Refugee called Abur Rahman is said to have prepared an embroidered Saddle-piece of his host Kamal Bhat of Ratson Village near Tral. This piece is believed to have revived the centuries old Gabba tradition of Kashmir. Maharaja Rambir Singh gave further fillip to the Gabba industry when he invited Muhammad Bat, Jamal Bat, Rasul Magray and Nur Sheikh, the masters of this craft, to Kashmir. The Shamianas, Qanats and Gabbas are prepared and used in the state guesthouses.
Despite inviting masters of the craft to Srinagar and planting of the trade in the city, the art could not last long in the city. The reasons for it were that the Srinagar based craftsmen were already employed in Shawl looms. So the Gabba sazi could not attract the attention of urban artists. The works from here went to the villages where the village artists were producing woolen blankets or Chaders. The Gabba saz had an easy access to the raw material in the villages. Anantnag gave a fillip to Gabba Sazi. It prepared maximum types of handicraft items and supplied them to other parts of Kashmir.
Although tradition of Gabba floor covering has very much decreased due to introduction of other modern floor covers, but still Gabbas are regarded as the classical floor covers. It is the need of the hour to improve its quality and promote this craft so that it can compete with other modern types of flooring which are gaining ground in Kashmiri households.
(Mr. Iqbal Ahmad, 49, was born in Parigam Chek, Kulgam. He is a graduate with Diploma in Numismatics, Archaeology and Heritage. He is an archaeologist, writer, and a cultural historian. He is employed by the Jammu and Kashmir State Government. Mr. Iqbal Ahmad has published 12 reference books on Kashmir archaeology and heritage.)
Preserving the Art of Gabba Sazi
Among the traditional matting’s of Kashmir, mention may be made of Patej, Wagu, and Gabba (local names for different kinds of floor matting). These types had once been very common and popular among the rural as well as the urban households. As the tradition had it, the Kashmiri women first used to plaster their room floors by a thin layer of clay mixtures and after drying, these floors were covered upon by the Patej and Wagu mats, which were made of straw and pechi. Usually the rural matting mostly consisted of the mats prepared of the straw, called Patej, while as the urban people had no access to the paddy straw so they would prefer the Wagu matting prepared of pechi which used to grow in the wetlands in outskirts of the city. This type of matting was not easy to make as it required a great deal of expertise to shape up a mat out of its constituents.
As the time passed by, this type of mat- making took the shape of Kashmiri art and a section of people adopted it as their profession. The wagu makers gradually took their product to the rural Kashmir and established their markets in villages.
Initially this type of flooring was introduced in village mosques, Khanqahas and Sufi shrines. Likewise rural artisans expanded their market of Patej to urban areas. Such types of matting was most common and every Kashmiri family could afford it easily. In addition to these cheap mattings, we had a tradition of expensive and most magnificent mats called Gabba.
Gabba mats were made of wool and embroidered skillfully with different colorful designs. This matting was very expensive and only well-to-do families could afford it. These mats were put over the straw mats. The ordinary families used such mattings only on special occasions and functions. Although, the tradition of these mats has almost vanished from Kashmiri households, but Gabba is still seen around, though not so commonly.
A Gabba is a unique type of floor covering prepared from old woolen blankets called ‘Chaeder’. It is made in a variety of forms and designs. The three major types of the Gabba are Appliqué or Dalgulaar with a circular star in the middle called Chand, embroidery and printed.
The Applique type of Gabba is con¬sidered of a high quality. In this form same coloured pieces of woolen blanket are brought together and embroidered on joints, which makes beautiful designs mostly of sun and moon. This type of Gabba is said to be the proto-type of Jamawar, where miniature needles were applied in bringing separately-embroidered pieces to¬gether. The embroidered ones are very common while as printed Gabba are merely the imitations of embroidered ones available at very cheap rates. The earlier types of appliqué designs have almost dis-appeared. One such piece called Mughal type Gabba is preserved in the textile gallery of the State Museum at Srinagar. The other types are common and produced in several localities of Anantnag.
Like other arts, Gabba Sazi is considered a very old art of Kashmir. Scholars have iden-tified bronze figure of Buddha dated to 6th century AD shown seated on such a floor cover which, according to them, resembles with a Gabba. On several olden paintings, the floor covers had been shown consisting of Kashmiri Gabba. To the late period, one Kabuli Refugee called Abur Rahman is said to have prepared an embroidered Saddle-piece of his host Kamal Bhat of Ratson Village near Tral. This piece is believed to have revived the centuries old Gabba tradition of Kashmir. Maharaja Rambir Singh gave further fillip to the Gabba industry when he invited Muhammad Bat, Jamal Bat, Rasul Magray and Nur Sheikh, the masters of this craft, to Kashmir. The Shamianas, Qanats and Gabbas are prepared and used in the state guesthouses.
Despite inviting masters of the craft to Srinagar and planting of the trade in the city, the art could not last long in the city. The reasons for it were that the Srinagar based craftsmen were already employed in Shawl looms. So the Gabba sazi could not attract the attention of urban artists. The works from here went to the villages where the village artists were producing woolen blankets or Chaders. The Gabba saz had an easy access to the raw material in the villages. Anantnag gave a fillip to Gabba Sazi. It prepared maximum types of handicraft items and supplied them to other parts of Kashmir.
Although tradition of Gabba floor covering has very much decreased due to introduction of other modern floor covers, but still Gabbas are regarded as the classical floor covers. It is the need of the hour to improve its quality and promote this craft so that it can compete with other modern types of flooring which are gaining ground in Kashmiri households.
Renewal of Hope
Manzoor with a keen eye, looks at farmers who welcome the paddy planting season with optimism and a sense of renewed hope
(Mr. Manzoor Akash, 25, was born in Rafiabad, Baramulla district. He completed his schooling locally, and earned degrees in B. Litt (comparative Literature) and M.A. in English from Barkatullah Vishwavidhyalaya, Bhopal. A very articulate writer, he has published numerous articles in various journals. He is also a budding poet, having published his first book of poems, "Verses of Heart," in 2006. Some of his poems have been reviewed by prominent literary critics in India. He has taught English at high school level, and hopes to teach in a university some day. Presently he teaches English at the Government Degree College in Kupwara.)
Season of Hope
In our Kashmir Valley the season for planting paddy (Tahl) has always been an attractive scene not only for residential poets Nature lovers but also for the tourists who crave to have a pack of sapling (Tahj Tohl) in their hands. This season which ranges form May to September falls under Kharif crop in India because not only 74% of population in India depends upon agriculture but also 45% of national income comes from agriculture sector. In states like West Bengal, Utter Pradesh, Andra Pradesh, Bihar and Punjab, etc. this crop is cultivated at large scale. However, our J&K state is not lagging behind. More than 80% population here is associated with this crop. This crop grows in temperature 24-260C and needs 80-200cm water supply. For this crop farmers first plough some land for sowing seed and then paddy is grown which is called ‘Tahj’ (paneeri) in local parlance. Where after paddy is excerpted by two, three or four laborers (men or women). Binded saplings extracted are then distributed in the already prepared paddy-fields for plantation. Unlike other states of India, this season of planting paddy is always welcome in Kashmir. Farmers receive this season with full warmth, joy, enthusiasm, fervour and delight.
This immortal season makes Yeomen to feel fortunate enough. This cherishing season has a hope of new life for our farmers because they believe it a golden season of instilling new life into things. They say, it is their Zira’at (agriculture), their whole life. They don’t like to make any haste in planting paddy. But they love to plant paddy saplings for days. They believe planting for days is a real gift because they are the days which they can pause to count their blessings and to know how cherished they are!
Farmers here wait and prepare carefully for the day of plantation and when this day arrives, life takes a new turn. Different dishes are cooked in Zamindar families in order to make this day a memorable and remarkable one. Farmers ask their neighbours and relatives for paddy plantation. They stop their other tasks and purchase many edibles on this day expensively. Nevertheless, these paddy planting days has taken a new turn nowadays. In olden days farmers used to give supper to their planters (Tahl Lagin Wale) but now supper is cancelled. Planters are now given Lipton tea at morning, lunch at noon and namkeen tea after 3:00 PM in the day. Rich farmers (Bahd Zamindar) take days in paddy planting where as poor farmers complete it within one or two days. The Charm which is at the first day of planting is not the same at the second or the third day.
Even family members who are away for some purpose outside state are informed about these days. Students who are busy with higher education abroad come back during this season. Men, women and even children love to plant paddy. In order to make this season more reminiscent and memorable women sing plaintive verses while planting seedlings collectively in the fields. Tourists from different states of India and abroad love to see people planting paddy in the rural areas. They take pictures to enjoy in the days to come.
This season attracts every traveler or beholder. It compels them to behold or stop for a while. It takes their hearts away and increases their throbbing speed when they listen sweet and melancholy strains sung in chorus by women. And when ever rural women are heard singing, Words Worth’s poetry- No nightingale did ever chant. A voice so thrilling never was heard. Stop here or gently pass! Naturally come to the mind and are uttered. The paddy fields remain bustling with dulcet and mellifluous sounds till darkness overpowers.
The sweet songs sung by females, especially, are sorrowful, situational and symbolize the lost glory. And when songs like:
Bade Doray Gil Chai Bolan, Dhor Mukliyav Lutheyay ………… (In big paddy-field Dicky-bird is calling to complete plantation of seedlings), and
Me Cha Nalus Doue, Ase Dhor Mukhloue ……… (I have thread round my neck. I tell you we have completed to plant the paddy field)
are chanted, listeners go poignant.
(Mr. Manzoor Akash, 25, was born in Rafiabad, Baramulla district. He completed his schooling locally, and earned degrees in B. Litt (comparative Literature) and M.A. in English from Barkatullah Vishwavidhyalaya, Bhopal. A very articulate writer, he has published numerous articles in various journals. He is also a budding poet, having published his first book of poems, "Verses of Heart," in 2006. Some of his poems have been reviewed by prominent literary critics in India. He has taught English at high school level, and hopes to teach in a university some day. Presently he teaches English at the Government Degree College in Kupwara.)
Season of Hope
In our Kashmir Valley the season for planting paddy (Tahl) has always been an attractive scene not only for residential poets Nature lovers but also for the tourists who crave to have a pack of sapling (Tahj Tohl) in their hands. This season which ranges form May to September falls under Kharif crop in India because not only 74% of population in India depends upon agriculture but also 45% of national income comes from agriculture sector. In states like West Bengal, Utter Pradesh, Andra Pradesh, Bihar and Punjab, etc. this crop is cultivated at large scale. However, our J&K state is not lagging behind. More than 80% population here is associated with this crop. This crop grows in temperature 24-260C and needs 80-200cm water supply. For this crop farmers first plough some land for sowing seed and then paddy is grown which is called ‘Tahj’ (paneeri) in local parlance. Where after paddy is excerpted by two, three or four laborers (men or women). Binded saplings extracted are then distributed in the already prepared paddy-fields for plantation. Unlike other states of India, this season of planting paddy is always welcome in Kashmir. Farmers receive this season with full warmth, joy, enthusiasm, fervour and delight.
This immortal season makes Yeomen to feel fortunate enough. This cherishing season has a hope of new life for our farmers because they believe it a golden season of instilling new life into things. They say, it is their Zira’at (agriculture), their whole life. They don’t like to make any haste in planting paddy. But they love to plant paddy saplings for days. They believe planting for days is a real gift because they are the days which they can pause to count their blessings and to know how cherished they are!
Farmers here wait and prepare carefully for the day of plantation and when this day arrives, life takes a new turn. Different dishes are cooked in Zamindar families in order to make this day a memorable and remarkable one. Farmers ask their neighbours and relatives for paddy plantation. They stop their other tasks and purchase many edibles on this day expensively. Nevertheless, these paddy planting days has taken a new turn nowadays. In olden days farmers used to give supper to their planters (Tahl Lagin Wale) but now supper is cancelled. Planters are now given Lipton tea at morning, lunch at noon and namkeen tea after 3:00 PM in the day. Rich farmers (Bahd Zamindar) take days in paddy planting where as poor farmers complete it within one or two days. The Charm which is at the first day of planting is not the same at the second or the third day.
Even family members who are away for some purpose outside state are informed about these days. Students who are busy with higher education abroad come back during this season. Men, women and even children love to plant paddy. In order to make this season more reminiscent and memorable women sing plaintive verses while planting seedlings collectively in the fields. Tourists from different states of India and abroad love to see people planting paddy in the rural areas. They take pictures to enjoy in the days to come.
This season attracts every traveler or beholder. It compels them to behold or stop for a while. It takes their hearts away and increases their throbbing speed when they listen sweet and melancholy strains sung in chorus by women. And when ever rural women are heard singing, Words Worth’s poetry- No nightingale did ever chant. A voice so thrilling never was heard. Stop here or gently pass! Naturally come to the mind and are uttered. The paddy fields remain bustling with dulcet and mellifluous sounds till darkness overpowers.
The sweet songs sung by females, especially, are sorrowful, situational and symbolize the lost glory. And when songs like:
Bade Doray Gil Chai Bolan, Dhor Mukliyav Lutheyay ………… (In big paddy-field Dicky-bird is calling to complete plantation of seedlings), and
Me Cha Nalus Doue, Ase Dhor Mukhloue ……… (I have thread round my neck. I tell you we have completed to plant the paddy field)
are chanted, listeners go poignant.
Violence Against Women
Salman's commentary on violence against women is both an eye opener and a shocker
(Mr. Salman Nizami, 25, was born in Banihal tehsil of District Ramban. He completed his graduate degree in mass communication and journalism, and joined journalism in 2004. He began his professional life at The OUTLOOK magazine as a columnist, and then started writing for Greater Kashmir, Kashmir Times, Times of India, The Hindu, Asian Age, Statesman, Rising Kashmir , JK Reporter. Mr. Nizami later joined SAHARA television in New Delhi as Desk Editor, and rose to the position of Group Editor of The Rastriya Sahara. He is currently working as a Editor-in-Chief of The Revolution newspaper published from Jammu and Kashmir, Sahara television as Desk Editor and Resident Editor of MID-DAY covering Upper North India including J&K. He is also active with UNICEF India and the Hungary World (NGO) as Media advisor. In that role, he has travelled widely investigating on new developments in the media industry, taking a special interest in child problems including labour, marriage, poverty, education, etc. He is one of the first journalists to research and write extensively about the child growth in Jammu and Kashmir.)
The Height of Desperation
Even the poorest families in Kashmir have matches and cooking fuel. The combination usually sustains life. But it can also be the makings of a horrifying escape: from poverty, from abuse and from depression.
The night before she burned herself, Azra Bano (name changed) took her children to her sister's for a family party. All seemed well. Later it emerged that she had not brought a present, and a relative had chided her for it, said her son Maroof Ahmed. This small thing apparently broke her. Zahida, who was 45, the mother of six children and earned pitiably little cleaning houses, ended up with burns on nearly 60 per cent of her body at the SMHS hospital, Srinagar.
Srinagar's two main hospitals - SMHS and SKIMS - receive three to four such cases on an average weekly. A large number of people, mostly from villages, don't even reach the hospitals - they die on the way or in local health centers. The hospital records show that survival of people from rural areas is very low while those from Srinagar is higher. The main reason of course, is the lack of medical care and trained staff in rural hospitals and health centers. It takes hours for emergency patients to reach hospitals in Srinagar. As per records, around 30 per cent people with cases of burning survive in hospitals. It is shameful here to admit to troubles at home, and mental illness often goes undiagnosed or untreated.
Women in Kashmir have suffered enormously since the separatist struggle became violent in 1989-90. Like the women in other conflict zones, they have been raped, tortured, maimed and killed. A few of them were even jailed for years together. According to a study by the Medecins Sans Frontieres, Kashmiri women are among the worst sufferers of sexual violence in the world. “Sexual violence has been routinely perpetrated on Kashmiri women, with 11.6% of respondents saying they were victims of sexual abuse,” says the 2005 study, adding that the figure is much higher than that of Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka and Chechnya. A study by Kashmir University’s Department of Sociology in 2002 revealed 90% of the estimated 10,000 Kashmiri war widows didn’t remarry despite provision of remarriage in Islam.
Surveys have shown that more Kashmiri women commit suicide than men. Says prominent sociologist Dr Bashir Ahmed Dabla: “Throughout the world, it’s found that suicide rates are highest among men and more intense in urban areas, but in the Valley the reverse is true.” He cited the raging conflict as the underlying factor. The most sinister burn cases are actually homicides masquerading as suicides, said doctors, nurses and human rights workers. ''We have two women here right now who were burnt by their mothers-in-law and husbands,'' said the hospital's surgeon Dr. Nadeem Ahmed.
Engaged at sixteen and married at 18, Farzana Akther (name changed) resorted to setting herself on fire when her father-in-law belittled her, saying she was not brave enough to do so. She was 20 and had endured years of beatings and abuse from her husband and his family. Defiant and depressed, she went into the yard. She handed her husband their nine-month-old daughter so the baby would not see her mother burning. Then she poured cooking fuel on herself. For a very few of the women who survive burns, the experience helps them change their lives. Some work with lawyers and request a divorce; most do not.
Many women mistakenly think death will be instant. Halima (name changed), 20, a patient in the hospital in January , said she considered jumping from a roof but worried she would only break her leg. If she set herself on fire, she said, ''it would all be over''. The problem is grave amongst the widows also who, after losing their husbands, the sole bread earners of the family, had to single handedly children. The lack of financial and emotional support on part of the families and society has put these widows in peril. “Losing the sole bread earner of the family and a life partner brings disaster to women. The problems become serious when she is left with children, who are toddlers or teens. All off a sudden all the burden is put on her. She has to earn, support and bring up her children. The only thought of these pressures are too disturbing for any women,” said Dr. Nadeem of SMHS hospital.
He added that women, who lose support from in-laws and have no support from parents either, fall prey to severe mental pressure, giving rise to depression. While some women are able to reside in their parents’ house, most are forced to live all alone with their children. “After losing husband, she feels insure. This feeling is augmented when her in-laws and sometime even parents are not in condition to provide financial and emotion support. She feels destitute, alone and insecure,” . The burden of responsibilities of earning, educating and bringing up children all alone becomes a life long pressure to these women most of whom prefer not to marry. “Since most of the widows do not marry for different reasons, they are put to pressure all life which are never shared. When this stress is perpetuated for years it gives rise to depression and hence she set her self on fire added the doctor.
In the hospital, Zahida rallied at first, and her son Maroof Ahmed was encouraged, unaware of how difficult it is to survive such extensive burns. The greatest risk is sepsis, a deadly infection that generally starts in the second week after a burn and is hard to stop. Even badly burnt and infected patients can speak almost up to the hour of their death, often giving families false hope. ''She was getting better,'' her son insisted. But the infection had, in fact, set in and the family did not have the money for powerful antibiotics that could give her whatever small chance there was to survive. Two weeks after his mother set herself on fire, Maroof stood by her bed as she stopped breathing.
(Mr. Salman Nizami, 25, was born in Banihal tehsil of District Ramban. He completed his graduate degree in mass communication and journalism, and joined journalism in 2004. He began his professional life at The OUTLOOK magazine as a columnist, and then started writing for Greater Kashmir, Kashmir Times, Times of India, The Hindu, Asian Age, Statesman, Rising Kashmir , JK Reporter. Mr. Nizami later joined SAHARA television in New Delhi as Desk Editor, and rose to the position of Group Editor of The Rastriya Sahara. He is currently working as a Editor-in-Chief of The Revolution newspaper published from Jammu and Kashmir, Sahara television as Desk Editor and Resident Editor of MID-DAY covering Upper North India including J&K. He is also active with UNICEF India and the Hungary World (NGO) as Media advisor. In that role, he has travelled widely investigating on new developments in the media industry, taking a special interest in child problems including labour, marriage, poverty, education, etc. He is one of the first journalists to research and write extensively about the child growth in Jammu and Kashmir.)
The Height of Desperation
Even the poorest families in Kashmir have matches and cooking fuel. The combination usually sustains life. But it can also be the makings of a horrifying escape: from poverty, from abuse and from depression.
The night before she burned herself, Azra Bano (name changed) took her children to her sister's for a family party. All seemed well. Later it emerged that she had not brought a present, and a relative had chided her for it, said her son Maroof Ahmed. This small thing apparently broke her. Zahida, who was 45, the mother of six children and earned pitiably little cleaning houses, ended up with burns on nearly 60 per cent of her body at the SMHS hospital, Srinagar.
Srinagar's two main hospitals - SMHS and SKIMS - receive three to four such cases on an average weekly. A large number of people, mostly from villages, don't even reach the hospitals - they die on the way or in local health centers. The hospital records show that survival of people from rural areas is very low while those from Srinagar is higher. The main reason of course, is the lack of medical care and trained staff in rural hospitals and health centers. It takes hours for emergency patients to reach hospitals in Srinagar. As per records, around 30 per cent people with cases of burning survive in hospitals. It is shameful here to admit to troubles at home, and mental illness often goes undiagnosed or untreated.
Women in Kashmir have suffered enormously since the separatist struggle became violent in 1989-90. Like the women in other conflict zones, they have been raped, tortured, maimed and killed. A few of them were even jailed for years together. According to a study by the Medecins Sans Frontieres, Kashmiri women are among the worst sufferers of sexual violence in the world. “Sexual violence has been routinely perpetrated on Kashmiri women, with 11.6% of respondents saying they were victims of sexual abuse,” says the 2005 study, adding that the figure is much higher than that of Sierra Leone, Sri Lanka and Chechnya. A study by Kashmir University’s Department of Sociology in 2002 revealed 90% of the estimated 10,000 Kashmiri war widows didn’t remarry despite provision of remarriage in Islam.
Surveys have shown that more Kashmiri women commit suicide than men. Says prominent sociologist Dr Bashir Ahmed Dabla: “Throughout the world, it’s found that suicide rates are highest among men and more intense in urban areas, but in the Valley the reverse is true.” He cited the raging conflict as the underlying factor. The most sinister burn cases are actually homicides masquerading as suicides, said doctors, nurses and human rights workers. ''We have two women here right now who were burnt by their mothers-in-law and husbands,'' said the hospital's surgeon Dr. Nadeem Ahmed.
Engaged at sixteen and married at 18, Farzana Akther (name changed) resorted to setting herself on fire when her father-in-law belittled her, saying she was not brave enough to do so. She was 20 and had endured years of beatings and abuse from her husband and his family. Defiant and depressed, she went into the yard. She handed her husband their nine-month-old daughter so the baby would not see her mother burning. Then she poured cooking fuel on herself. For a very few of the women who survive burns, the experience helps them change their lives. Some work with lawyers and request a divorce; most do not.
Many women mistakenly think death will be instant. Halima (name changed), 20, a patient in the hospital in January , said she considered jumping from a roof but worried she would only break her leg. If she set herself on fire, she said, ''it would all be over''. The problem is grave amongst the widows also who, after losing their husbands, the sole bread earners of the family, had to single handedly children. The lack of financial and emotional support on part of the families and society has put these widows in peril. “Losing the sole bread earner of the family and a life partner brings disaster to women. The problems become serious when she is left with children, who are toddlers or teens. All off a sudden all the burden is put on her. She has to earn, support and bring up her children. The only thought of these pressures are too disturbing for any women,” said Dr. Nadeem of SMHS hospital.
He added that women, who lose support from in-laws and have no support from parents either, fall prey to severe mental pressure, giving rise to depression. While some women are able to reside in their parents’ house, most are forced to live all alone with their children. “After losing husband, she feels insure. This feeling is augmented when her in-laws and sometime even parents are not in condition to provide financial and emotion support. She feels destitute, alone and insecure,” . The burden of responsibilities of earning, educating and bringing up children all alone becomes a life long pressure to these women most of whom prefer not to marry. “Since most of the widows do not marry for different reasons, they are put to pressure all life which are never shared. When this stress is perpetuated for years it gives rise to depression and hence she set her self on fire added the doctor.
In the hospital, Zahida rallied at first, and her son Maroof Ahmed was encouraged, unaware of how difficult it is to survive such extensive burns. The greatest risk is sepsis, a deadly infection that generally starts in the second week after a burn and is hard to stop. Even badly burnt and infected patients can speak almost up to the hour of their death, often giving families false hope. ''She was getting better,'' her son insisted. But the infection had, in fact, set in and the family did not have the money for powerful antibiotics that could give her whatever small chance there was to survive. Two weeks after his mother set herself on fire, Maroof stood by her bed as she stopped breathing.
Bridging the Divide Between Kashmiri Pandits and Muslims
Riyaz and the author exchange notes on how the gulf between Kashmir Pandits and Muslims can be bridged. Mr. Ahmad's thought provoking commentary is followed by the author's message, both printed in the Greater Kashmir
Truth and Reconciliation
Riyaz Ahmad
After a while, Kashmiri pandit migration is back in focus. This time, the mood is more introspective and less bitter. This is evident in the movie I Am by the director Sanjay Suri, himself a Kashmiri pandit whose father was killed by the gunmen in 1990. The movie has triggered fresh debate about the circumstances of the pandit migration from Valley and the relations of the community with the Muslim majority in the state. And for once, there is an element of recognition of each other's pain in the discourse.
The resulting environment of reconciliation has been further aided by the return of around 1700 pandits to Valley as part of the Prime Minister's Rehabilitation Policy. And what is heartening about the development is that not all of them are staying at the housing blocks set up at the secluded places by the government. Many have gone back to live in their native villages as tenants with their Muslim neghbours. Separatist leaders have contributed their mite by extending a warm welcome to them. Hurriyat (G) chief Syed Ali Shah Geelani went to meet the pandits staying at a camp in South Kashmir. Similarly, JKLF supremo Yasin Malik did the same. He raised his voice for the missing Kashmiri pandit youth in North Kashmir.
While we need to appreciate the positive tenor of these developments, the reconciliation will need the two communities to confront and accept the truth of what came to pass in the first place.
The current mood of introspection provides a rare opportunity to revisit the troubling source of the prevailing estrangement between them. The Pandits fled Valley soon after the outbreak of the separatist violence towards the end of 1989. Their migration has also its explanations and counter-explanation. While Muslims generally believe it was the handiwork of the then Governor Jagmohan, the pandits too have a standard reasoning: their selective and exclusive killings by the militants. Even though, one could grant a shade of truth in both the accounts, there was a fundamental apolitical driver of Pandit migration which both the communities find unattractive. That is, Pandits also left for ideological reasons. Here was a community caught unenviably between the expectation of a majority community with contrary political aspirations and the allegiance to a country they called their own.
What made things further difficult was that the majority population was locked in an unyielding tussle with this country which severely tested pandits’ efforts to negotiate the divide. And within the first year of the separatist movement itself, the pandit community had reached a point of no-negotiation and its own moment of truth. Random killings of its members only further accelerated this end-of-the-road feeling. Because they didn’t believe in the militant movement for an independent Kashmir or accession to Pakistan, why get killed alongside a struggle they had no stakes in.
But while we acknowledge the haplessness of the community under the circumstances, there is a parallel narrative, historically more convoluted and with a humanitarian angle that is much more pronounced. It is not the ‘rightness or wrongness’ of the situations that makes it so but the sheer size of the relative suffering. And it is the suffering of the Muslim majority in Valley in the course of the separatist revolt. Of course, it is difficult to blame a particular community for launching a political struggle or to put it more neutrally, for getting caught in an unfolding historical process. And once we have sorted out this intellectual tangle, one can formulate a degree of moral equivalence between the situations of the two communities.
The narrative of the Muslims in the state goes like this: Pandits were not selectively killed. Many more Muslims also died along their side for the same reasons. That the Pandit killings were essentially political rather than communal in nature. And of course, Jagmohan played a certain role in seeing pandits off. There is also an argument that the volume of the tragedy of Muslims in the state is disproportionately bigger than that of the pandits. Some call for the “compartmentalization of the grief”, which, it is argued, makes the Kashmiri pandit situation a small part of the larger Kashmir tragedy. Some also refer to a degree of recognition and sanctity for pandit deaths and complain that the killings of Muslims by comparison has become as a statistical heap, with ever-growing number of widows and orphans littering the landscape. This narrative feels outraged by the allegations of genocide by some Pandit sections, over-the-top propaganda about Talibanization of Valley, website after website spewing hate against Muslims of Kashmir and distortion of history.
There is a valid counter to this thinking among Pandits. That is, while Muslims are seen to have suffered for their rebellion against the state, pandits suffered for the mere fact of being co-inhabitants of the place. The community also harbours some genuine existential fears. While migration may have plugged a substantial section of pandit community into a brave new world of opportunities – many from the community largely make up a prosperous slice of Kashmiri diaspora – the community is menaced by some real doubts about its survival and identity that that have a resonance over and above the indignities of the camp life. The community has a legitimate all-pervading fear of ethnic extinction. And nothing exemplifies this better than the websites like kashmiribhatta.in whose singular task is documenting the names and profiles of Kashmiri Pandits in the country and their diaspora. The kashmiribhatta.in was launched in Jammu in February, 2008. “Knowledge about the community is fading,” wrote the site promoters grimly. “It needs all out effort to revive the same”. One can also find the exclusive kashmiri pandit matrimonials on some sites. There are also the lists of prominent pandit personalities on wikipedia documenting names of everybody from philosophers to politicians, bureaucrats to journalists and theatre artists to film actors. The community is also paranoid about its institutional and religious properties in the valley which it alleges are being sold off in the absence of effective government legislation to check it.
Over the past two decades, not only has Pandit issue become tangled with the larger Kashmir problem, acquiring the fraught political overtones of its own, but their return to their former homes is still viewed as a tricky proposition. So much so, that their return and rehabilitation in Valley has become the most exacting yardstick of the normalcy in Kashmir. Kashmir , it is said, can hardly be called truly peaceful until Pandits are able to return and settle back freely.
But this is not easy. Return and resettling back into the warp and woof of Kashmiri life cannot happen by state intervention which so far has tried to do it by building separate walled blocks and creating pandit ghettos. Such an approach will only perpetuate the divide and may even render it permanent. Only path is an honest acknowledgement of the truth of each other's narrative and building on it a vision of a shared future. But does this idealistic and wishful prospect have any chance in an intrinsically flawed setting of Kashmir, where vested interests monopolize the agenda and often subvert a clear perspective of the reality. But then what is the way-out?
In response to Riyaz Ahmad's Truth and Reconciliation
http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2011/May/30/in-response-to-riyaz-ahmad-s-truth-and-reconciliation-7.asp
I commend Riyaz Ahmad for writing an honest and objective commentary about terms of endearment between Kashmiri Pandits and Muslims in his thought provoking piece titled, “Truth and Reconciliation” (GK, May 25).
What I found missing was the potential role of the civil society in bridging the divide, which cannot be repaired by visits of a few notables to meet returning Pandits or attestation of goodwill by well meaning commentators. One needs to look beyond such superficial gestures in understanding what is truly holding back Pandits from returning to their homeland.
For 20 years, the Jammu and Kashmir Government has dumped the rehabilitation of Kashmiri Pandits in the lap of the Central Government in New Delhi. While the State government is eager to own up to kith and kin of militants and those who crossed the border to receive terrorist training, it has yet to define a place for Pandit rehabilitation within the State Budget and priorities. The result is that the physical divide has been accentuated by an economic divide, leaving Pandits outside of State economy. The 3,000 or so jobs paid by a grant from the Central government is not a solution to what is essentially a State problem involving a State constituency. Indeed, the economic condition of Pandits who stayed in the valley and did not leave during the peak of militancy is not a reassuring picture and does not bode well for Pandits who would like to return from their self-exile.
Similarly, I have yet to see a single element of the civil society fret about diminishing political visibility of Pandits in the State. The election on a couple of non-political Pandit candidates in the Panchayat elections is a welcome news, but it can in no way replace a Pandit State cabinet minister, which the state did have until recently. Without political standing there is no future in a democratic institution. That is why such institutions are pluralistic and do not always represent the “tyranny of the majority.” If it were not so, India would not have a Sikh Prime Minister or a Christian as a leader of a major national party.
Besides seeking economic and political space, Kashmiri Pandits have a reason to demand security for their cultural space which is shrinking. I wonder why the civil society has never sought an explanation from the State Government regarding the Legislative Bill on reorganizing valley Hindu temples that was published in the State Gazette on 9th January 2008 (http://www.kashmirforum.org/images/3279_001.pdf), and then simply put away.
In the end, though, it is not Abdullahs, Mufts, Geelanis or Maliks who will decide whether Pandits have a future in the valley. Their likely return and sustainable survival in the valley will be decided by similar urges of “aam admi” on the street wishing for justice, dignity, jobs and good governance in the valley today. For too long, people in the valley have been told that such “favours” are inappropriate without a final political settlement of the State. Time is fast approaching when the public will see through such lies and demand a change. Someday there will be a “Kashmir Spring.”
What is good for Kashmir is good for its inhabitants, whether Muslims or Pandits.
Vijay K. Sazawal, Ph.D.
(www.kashmirforum.org)
http://epaper.greaterkashmir.com/showtext.aspx?parentid=13582&boxid=2332578&issuedate=3052011
(the editor of the GK chose to delete the word "terrorist" from my write-up)
Truth and Reconciliation
Riyaz Ahmad
After a while, Kashmiri pandit migration is back in focus. This time, the mood is more introspective and less bitter. This is evident in the movie I Am by the director Sanjay Suri, himself a Kashmiri pandit whose father was killed by the gunmen in 1990. The movie has triggered fresh debate about the circumstances of the pandit migration from Valley and the relations of the community with the Muslim majority in the state. And for once, there is an element of recognition of each other's pain in the discourse.
The resulting environment of reconciliation has been further aided by the return of around 1700 pandits to Valley as part of the Prime Minister's Rehabilitation Policy. And what is heartening about the development is that not all of them are staying at the housing blocks set up at the secluded places by the government. Many have gone back to live in their native villages as tenants with their Muslim neghbours. Separatist leaders have contributed their mite by extending a warm welcome to them. Hurriyat (G) chief Syed Ali Shah Geelani went to meet the pandits staying at a camp in South Kashmir. Similarly, JKLF supremo Yasin Malik did the same. He raised his voice for the missing Kashmiri pandit youth in North Kashmir.
While we need to appreciate the positive tenor of these developments, the reconciliation will need the two communities to confront and accept the truth of what came to pass in the first place.
The current mood of introspection provides a rare opportunity to revisit the troubling source of the prevailing estrangement between them. The Pandits fled Valley soon after the outbreak of the separatist violence towards the end of 1989. Their migration has also its explanations and counter-explanation. While Muslims generally believe it was the handiwork of the then Governor Jagmohan, the pandits too have a standard reasoning: their selective and exclusive killings by the militants. Even though, one could grant a shade of truth in both the accounts, there was a fundamental apolitical driver of Pandit migration which both the communities find unattractive. That is, Pandits also left for ideological reasons. Here was a community caught unenviably between the expectation of a majority community with contrary political aspirations and the allegiance to a country they called their own.
What made things further difficult was that the majority population was locked in an unyielding tussle with this country which severely tested pandits’ efforts to negotiate the divide. And within the first year of the separatist movement itself, the pandit community had reached a point of no-negotiation and its own moment of truth. Random killings of its members only further accelerated this end-of-the-road feeling. Because they didn’t believe in the militant movement for an independent Kashmir or accession to Pakistan, why get killed alongside a struggle they had no stakes in.
But while we acknowledge the haplessness of the community under the circumstances, there is a parallel narrative, historically more convoluted and with a humanitarian angle that is much more pronounced. It is not the ‘rightness or wrongness’ of the situations that makes it so but the sheer size of the relative suffering. And it is the suffering of the Muslim majority in Valley in the course of the separatist revolt. Of course, it is difficult to blame a particular community for launching a political struggle or to put it more neutrally, for getting caught in an unfolding historical process. And once we have sorted out this intellectual tangle, one can formulate a degree of moral equivalence between the situations of the two communities.
The narrative of the Muslims in the state goes like this: Pandits were not selectively killed. Many more Muslims also died along their side for the same reasons. That the Pandit killings were essentially political rather than communal in nature. And of course, Jagmohan played a certain role in seeing pandits off. There is also an argument that the volume of the tragedy of Muslims in the state is disproportionately bigger than that of the pandits. Some call for the “compartmentalization of the grief”, which, it is argued, makes the Kashmiri pandit situation a small part of the larger Kashmir tragedy. Some also refer to a degree of recognition and sanctity for pandit deaths and complain that the killings of Muslims by comparison has become as a statistical heap, with ever-growing number of widows and orphans littering the landscape. This narrative feels outraged by the allegations of genocide by some Pandit sections, over-the-top propaganda about Talibanization of Valley, website after website spewing hate against Muslims of Kashmir and distortion of history.
There is a valid counter to this thinking among Pandits. That is, while Muslims are seen to have suffered for their rebellion against the state, pandits suffered for the mere fact of being co-inhabitants of the place. The community also harbours some genuine existential fears. While migration may have plugged a substantial section of pandit community into a brave new world of opportunities – many from the community largely make up a prosperous slice of Kashmiri diaspora – the community is menaced by some real doubts about its survival and identity that that have a resonance over and above the indignities of the camp life. The community has a legitimate all-pervading fear of ethnic extinction. And nothing exemplifies this better than the websites like kashmiribhatta.in whose singular task is documenting the names and profiles of Kashmiri Pandits in the country and their diaspora. The kashmiribhatta.in was launched in Jammu in February, 2008. “Knowledge about the community is fading,” wrote the site promoters grimly. “It needs all out effort to revive the same”. One can also find the exclusive kashmiri pandit matrimonials on some sites. There are also the lists of prominent pandit personalities on wikipedia documenting names of everybody from philosophers to politicians, bureaucrats to journalists and theatre artists to film actors. The community is also paranoid about its institutional and religious properties in the valley which it alleges are being sold off in the absence of effective government legislation to check it.
Over the past two decades, not only has Pandit issue become tangled with the larger Kashmir problem, acquiring the fraught political overtones of its own, but their return to their former homes is still viewed as a tricky proposition. So much so, that their return and rehabilitation in Valley has become the most exacting yardstick of the normalcy in Kashmir. Kashmir , it is said, can hardly be called truly peaceful until Pandits are able to return and settle back freely.
But this is not easy. Return and resettling back into the warp and woof of Kashmiri life cannot happen by state intervention which so far has tried to do it by building separate walled blocks and creating pandit ghettos. Such an approach will only perpetuate the divide and may even render it permanent. Only path is an honest acknowledgement of the truth of each other's narrative and building on it a vision of a shared future. But does this idealistic and wishful prospect have any chance in an intrinsically flawed setting of Kashmir, where vested interests monopolize the agenda and often subvert a clear perspective of the reality. But then what is the way-out?
In response to Riyaz Ahmad's Truth and Reconciliation
http://www.greaterkashmir.com/news/2011/May/30/in-response-to-riyaz-ahmad-s-truth-and-reconciliation-7.asp
I commend Riyaz Ahmad for writing an honest and objective commentary about terms of endearment between Kashmiri Pandits and Muslims in his thought provoking piece titled, “Truth and Reconciliation” (GK, May 25).
What I found missing was the potential role of the civil society in bridging the divide, which cannot be repaired by visits of a few notables to meet returning Pandits or attestation of goodwill by well meaning commentators. One needs to look beyond such superficial gestures in understanding what is truly holding back Pandits from returning to their homeland.
For 20 years, the Jammu and Kashmir Government has dumped the rehabilitation of Kashmiri Pandits in the lap of the Central Government in New Delhi. While the State government is eager to own up to kith and kin of militants and those who crossed the border to receive terrorist training, it has yet to define a place for Pandit rehabilitation within the State Budget and priorities. The result is that the physical divide has been accentuated by an economic divide, leaving Pandits outside of State economy. The 3,000 or so jobs paid by a grant from the Central government is not a solution to what is essentially a State problem involving a State constituency. Indeed, the economic condition of Pandits who stayed in the valley and did not leave during the peak of militancy is not a reassuring picture and does not bode well for Pandits who would like to return from their self-exile.
Similarly, I have yet to see a single element of the civil society fret about diminishing political visibility of Pandits in the State. The election on a couple of non-political Pandit candidates in the Panchayat elections is a welcome news, but it can in no way replace a Pandit State cabinet minister, which the state did have until recently. Without political standing there is no future in a democratic institution. That is why such institutions are pluralistic and do not always represent the “tyranny of the majority.” If it were not so, India would not have a Sikh Prime Minister or a Christian as a leader of a major national party.
Besides seeking economic and political space, Kashmiri Pandits have a reason to demand security for their cultural space which is shrinking. I wonder why the civil society has never sought an explanation from the State Government regarding the Legislative Bill on reorganizing valley Hindu temples that was published in the State Gazette on 9th January 2008 (http://www.kashmirforum.org/images/3279_001.pdf), and then simply put away.
In the end, though, it is not Abdullahs, Mufts, Geelanis or Maliks who will decide whether Pandits have a future in the valley. Their likely return and sustainable survival in the valley will be decided by similar urges of “aam admi” on the street wishing for justice, dignity, jobs and good governance in the valley today. For too long, people in the valley have been told that such “favours” are inappropriate without a final political settlement of the State. Time is fast approaching when the public will see through such lies and demand a change. Someday there will be a “Kashmir Spring.”
What is good for Kashmir is good for its inhabitants, whether Muslims or Pandits.
Vijay K. Sazawal, Ph.D.
(www.kashmirforum.org)
http://epaper.greaterkashmir.com/showtext.aspx?parentid=13582&boxid=2332578&issuedate=3052011
(the editor of the GK chose to delete the word "terrorist" from my write-up)
Recalling the first Jammu Dogra President of the National Conference
Balraj Puri argues for greater recognition and honor for a true secularist from Jammu named Budh Singh
(Mr. Balraj Puri, 81, was born in Jammu city and attended the Ranbir High School and the Prince of Wales College in Jammu. He is a journalist, human rights activist and a writer who has been an eye witness to the turbulent history of the State. He has written 5 books, including the historical "5000 years of Kashmir" in 1997. He is the Convenor of the J&K State branch of the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), and the Director of the Institute of Jammu and Kashmir Affairs, based in Jammu.)
Budh Singh: The symbol of unity of the State
Does not the founder of freedom movement in the state deserve to be honoured in better ways?
Mahatma Budh Singh, whose 127th birth anniversary was celebrated on May 28 in Jammu, is fittest symbol of the unity of the State. People of Jammu gave him the highest honour by electing him thrice president of the Dogra Sabha, the only public organisation permitted at that time. The people of Kashmir gave him the unique honour of twice electing him the president of then premier political party, the National Conference.
The other person who occupied this august office was Sheikh Abdullah. He used to call Budh Singh as his spiritual father. The Sikhs of the country honoured him by selecting him one of the Panj Piaras (the holy five) to lay the foundation stone of renovated the Panja Sahib, their most sacred shrine.
He is thus most relevant today as the only inter-religions and inter-regional bridge of the State which is otherwise drifting in divergent directions.
Budh Singh was founder of the freedom movement in the state. He resigned from what used to be a very prestigious post of the deputy commissioner (then called Wazir Wazarat) in 1925 to lay the foundations of the movement for freedom and against autocracy in the state six years before the Muslim Conference was formed and fourteen years before it was converted into the National Conference in which Budh Singh played the major role.
During his three-term presidentship of Dogra Sabha Budh Singh politicised it and declared it as the Congress Party of the state. The Dogra Sabha was banned when it gave a call for hartal on the arrest of Mahatma Gandhi. Thereafter Budh Singh founded the Kisan Party in 1934. The same year he was elected to the first State Assembly called the Praja Sabha from Mirpur-Poonch constituency. Thus the freedom movement and secular politics started in Jammu much earlier than it did in Kashmir Valley.
Even in service he had espoused the cause of common man and identified himself with Congress and Mahatma Gandhi. In 1915 he was the first known person in Jammu and Kashmir State to respond to the Swadeshi Call of Mahatma Gandhi and started wearing khadi and black turban to identify himself with Akali Dal which had launched anti British agitation as an ally of the Congress. He was also the first person to give vocal expression to protest against the practice of "beggear" according to which any person could be coerced to do labour work without any compensation. He organised as deputy commissioner a public meeting in Hazuri Bagh in Srinagar in 1915 to protest against this inhuman practice. Perhaps this too was the first public expression of the grievances of Kashmir.
Budh Singh was imprisoned for varying terms for three times. For the first time he was detailed in a dungeon cell of Bahu Fort. Though no formal charge was made for this detention yet the Cabinet had taken exception to and proscribed his two Urdu pamphlets entitled "Kisan ki dastan" and "Garibon ke dukh ka illaj". The cabinet got special permission, to detain him, from Maharaja Hari Singh who was at that time abroad.
In fact Budh Singh had become embarrassment for his other party colleagues soon after they assumed power after independence. His austere and some what puritan and exacting standard of life was out of tune with the new culture of power. In less than two years, his portfolio was changed from Relief and Rehabilitation to Health and then to Information and Broadcasting. Eventually he resigned from the cabinet in October 1950.
I was one of those who demanded setting up of a separate Provincial Committee of the National Conference for Jammu region. Budh Singh was the natural choice to be its President. But this role, too, was not much palatable to some of his Kashmiri colleagues. He records in his autobiography that it hurt him when Sheikh Abdullah accrued him of regional bias in his role as Provincial President of the party. He was got rid of this role as also removed from the state politics when he was sent to Rajya Sabha in 1952.
Sheikh Abdullah had not forgotten or forgiven Budh Singh's differences with him in 1953. When the Sheikh came from Delhi to Jammu to assume the Chief Ministership, I advised him that the first thing he should do was to see Budh Singh and seek his blessings. Abdullah angrily retorted that he would not do so on account of Budh Singh's role in 1953. I, too, protested in almost similar tone that the Sheikh was joining hands and seeking cooperation of the Congress party which was wholly responsible for his dismissal and arrest in 1953. He had also accepted a dinner invitation from Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad who had stabbed him in the back. He had also condoled the death of DP Dhar at his residence who was the key figure in the coup of 1953. On what basis he could single out Budh Singh for such a hostile attitude. I left the Sheikh at that. But in my very first next meeting, he told me that soon after I left he rushed to see Budh Singh and got his blessings. He thanked me for my frank advice. Otherwise, he said, this lapse would have been a permanent burden on his conscience. He was deeply moved by the affection with which Budh Singh received him and gave him his "Ashirwad".
While after years of efforts, Farooq Abdullah agreed to name a road — from Ranbishwar Chowk via MLAs hostel to Indira Chowk — after Budh Singh. After his government, the name was changed to MLAs Hostel Marg. After a long struggle and threat of Satyagrah, I eventually succeeded in getting it renamed as Mahatma Budh Singh Marg.
But does not founder of the freedom movement in the state deserve to be honoured in better ways?
My demand for starting Budh Singh chair in the University of Jammu, though agreed in principle by the previous government in the State, has yet not been implemented. But is there any other personality in the State whose message is more relevant today?
(Mr. Balraj Puri, 81, was born in Jammu city and attended the Ranbir High School and the Prince of Wales College in Jammu. He is a journalist, human rights activist and a writer who has been an eye witness to the turbulent history of the State. He has written 5 books, including the historical "5000 years of Kashmir" in 1997. He is the Convenor of the J&K State branch of the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), and the Director of the Institute of Jammu and Kashmir Affairs, based in Jammu.)
Budh Singh: The symbol of unity of the State
Does not the founder of freedom movement in the state deserve to be honoured in better ways?
Mahatma Budh Singh, whose 127th birth anniversary was celebrated on May 28 in Jammu, is fittest symbol of the unity of the State. People of Jammu gave him the highest honour by electing him thrice president of the Dogra Sabha, the only public organisation permitted at that time. The people of Kashmir gave him the unique honour of twice electing him the president of then premier political party, the National Conference.
The other person who occupied this august office was Sheikh Abdullah. He used to call Budh Singh as his spiritual father. The Sikhs of the country honoured him by selecting him one of the Panj Piaras (the holy five) to lay the foundation stone of renovated the Panja Sahib, their most sacred shrine.
He is thus most relevant today as the only inter-religions and inter-regional bridge of the State which is otherwise drifting in divergent directions.
Budh Singh was founder of the freedom movement in the state. He resigned from what used to be a very prestigious post of the deputy commissioner (then called Wazir Wazarat) in 1925 to lay the foundations of the movement for freedom and against autocracy in the state six years before the Muslim Conference was formed and fourteen years before it was converted into the National Conference in which Budh Singh played the major role.
During his three-term presidentship of Dogra Sabha Budh Singh politicised it and declared it as the Congress Party of the state. The Dogra Sabha was banned when it gave a call for hartal on the arrest of Mahatma Gandhi. Thereafter Budh Singh founded the Kisan Party in 1934. The same year he was elected to the first State Assembly called the Praja Sabha from Mirpur-Poonch constituency. Thus the freedom movement and secular politics started in Jammu much earlier than it did in Kashmir Valley.
Even in service he had espoused the cause of common man and identified himself with Congress and Mahatma Gandhi. In 1915 he was the first known person in Jammu and Kashmir State to respond to the Swadeshi Call of Mahatma Gandhi and started wearing khadi and black turban to identify himself with Akali Dal which had launched anti British agitation as an ally of the Congress. He was also the first person to give vocal expression to protest against the practice of "beggear" according to which any person could be coerced to do labour work without any compensation. He organised as deputy commissioner a public meeting in Hazuri Bagh in Srinagar in 1915 to protest against this inhuman practice. Perhaps this too was the first public expression of the grievances of Kashmir.
Budh Singh was imprisoned for varying terms for three times. For the first time he was detailed in a dungeon cell of Bahu Fort. Though no formal charge was made for this detention yet the Cabinet had taken exception to and proscribed his two Urdu pamphlets entitled "Kisan ki dastan" and "Garibon ke dukh ka illaj". The cabinet got special permission, to detain him, from Maharaja Hari Singh who was at that time abroad.
In fact Budh Singh had become embarrassment for his other party colleagues soon after they assumed power after independence. His austere and some what puritan and exacting standard of life was out of tune with the new culture of power. In less than two years, his portfolio was changed from Relief and Rehabilitation to Health and then to Information and Broadcasting. Eventually he resigned from the cabinet in October 1950.
I was one of those who demanded setting up of a separate Provincial Committee of the National Conference for Jammu region. Budh Singh was the natural choice to be its President. But this role, too, was not much palatable to some of his Kashmiri colleagues. He records in his autobiography that it hurt him when Sheikh Abdullah accrued him of regional bias in his role as Provincial President of the party. He was got rid of this role as also removed from the state politics when he was sent to Rajya Sabha in 1952.
Sheikh Abdullah had not forgotten or forgiven Budh Singh's differences with him in 1953. When the Sheikh came from Delhi to Jammu to assume the Chief Ministership, I advised him that the first thing he should do was to see Budh Singh and seek his blessings. Abdullah angrily retorted that he would not do so on account of Budh Singh's role in 1953. I, too, protested in almost similar tone that the Sheikh was joining hands and seeking cooperation of the Congress party which was wholly responsible for his dismissal and arrest in 1953. He had also accepted a dinner invitation from Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad who had stabbed him in the back. He had also condoled the death of DP Dhar at his residence who was the key figure in the coup of 1953. On what basis he could single out Budh Singh for such a hostile attitude. I left the Sheikh at that. But in my very first next meeting, he told me that soon after I left he rushed to see Budh Singh and got his blessings. He thanked me for my frank advice. Otherwise, he said, this lapse would have been a permanent burden on his conscience. He was deeply moved by the affection with which Budh Singh received him and gave him his "Ashirwad".
While after years of efforts, Farooq Abdullah agreed to name a road — from Ranbishwar Chowk via MLAs hostel to Indira Chowk — after Budh Singh. After his government, the name was changed to MLAs Hostel Marg. After a long struggle and threat of Satyagrah, I eventually succeeded in getting it renamed as Mahatma Budh Singh Marg.
But does not founder of the freedom movement in the state deserve to be honoured in better ways?
My demand for starting Budh Singh chair in the University of Jammu, though agreed in principle by the previous government in the State, has yet not been implemented. But is there any other personality in the State whose message is more relevant today?
Double Jeopardy - Handicapped People have Little Political Clout
The editorial in the Rising Kashmir advises the J&K Government to address concerns of people suffering from physical and mental disabilities
Reach Out to Them
All J&K Handicapped Association Thursday called off its hunger strike after assurance from Chief Minister Omar Abdullah that their genuine demands will be sorted out. While the physically challenged persons have long been complaining about the government apathy, there has been no real effort on part of the authorities to address their grievances.
Even the packages announced by New Delhi from time to time have nothing to offer to these hapless people. The preoccupation of the government to maintain law and order in the valley, particularly in the last three years, has meant that many vulnerable sections of the society continue to suffer. We get to hear the ministers and officials talk at length about the problems faced by physically disabled and the schemes meant for their welfare on occasions like World Disability Day. They don’t go beyond the token gestures of giving prosthetic limbs, wheel chairs or cheques to some disabled persons. As a result, the real problems facing them remain unaddressed.
There has been a two-fold increase in the number of physically challenged persons in the valley over the last 10 years.
According to Census 2001, there were around three lakh physically challenged persons across the state, which has increased to over seven lakh during the last 10 years. The increase in disability cases is attributed to firing, blasts, street protests and other such incidents. Given the situation in the valley in the last three years, there has been a sharp increase in the number of persons rendered handicap in police and CRPF action. Persons who survive bullet and pellet injuries add to the ever-growing list. There has also been a surge in the mental disorder cases in the past two decades.
Some non-governmental organizations like Medicos Sans Frontiers (MSF) have been doing their bit to help the people suffering from anxiety, depression and Post Traumatic Stress Disorders. According to MSF, 30 per cent of patients in the valley are suffering from anxiety and depression, 18 per cent are suffering from mental illness as a result of physical health problems, 15 per cent are mood related disorders and rest are suffering from psychological instability, domestic problems and trauma. Among the affected lot, 60 per cent are women. Furthermore, during its studies, MSF has discovered that 50 per cent of these cases have trauma background and in one way or the other related to conflict. The government must take concrete steps to alleviate their sufferings. The government must live up to its claims of improving health sector. It must work for the betterment of persons suffering from physical and mental disabilities.
Reach Out to Them
All J&K Handicapped Association Thursday called off its hunger strike after assurance from Chief Minister Omar Abdullah that their genuine demands will be sorted out. While the physically challenged persons have long been complaining about the government apathy, there has been no real effort on part of the authorities to address their grievances.
Even the packages announced by New Delhi from time to time have nothing to offer to these hapless people. The preoccupation of the government to maintain law and order in the valley, particularly in the last three years, has meant that many vulnerable sections of the society continue to suffer. We get to hear the ministers and officials talk at length about the problems faced by physically disabled and the schemes meant for their welfare on occasions like World Disability Day. They don’t go beyond the token gestures of giving prosthetic limbs, wheel chairs or cheques to some disabled persons. As a result, the real problems facing them remain unaddressed.
There has been a two-fold increase in the number of physically challenged persons in the valley over the last 10 years.
According to Census 2001, there were around three lakh physically challenged persons across the state, which has increased to over seven lakh during the last 10 years. The increase in disability cases is attributed to firing, blasts, street protests and other such incidents. Given the situation in the valley in the last three years, there has been a sharp increase in the number of persons rendered handicap in police and CRPF action. Persons who survive bullet and pellet injuries add to the ever-growing list. There has also been a surge in the mental disorder cases in the past two decades.
Some non-governmental organizations like Medicos Sans Frontiers (MSF) have been doing their bit to help the people suffering from anxiety, depression and Post Traumatic Stress Disorders. According to MSF, 30 per cent of patients in the valley are suffering from anxiety and depression, 18 per cent are suffering from mental illness as a result of physical health problems, 15 per cent are mood related disorders and rest are suffering from psychological instability, domestic problems and trauma. Among the affected lot, 60 per cent are women. Furthermore, during its studies, MSF has discovered that 50 per cent of these cases have trauma background and in one way or the other related to conflict. The government must take concrete steps to alleviate their sufferings. The government must live up to its claims of improving health sector. It must work for the betterment of persons suffering from physical and mental disabilities.
Kashmir's Shrinking Farm Lands
When Corruption, greed and opportunism intersect, the fall-out is mostly expreessed in terms of real-estate transfers
Kashmir's Shrinking Farm Lands, Victim of Development?
Srinagar: Kashmir Valley gives a perfect image of lush, green countryside. But thanks to insatiable greed for money and dipping profits in agriculture, the fields of the valley would soon be buried under skyscrapers, factories and automobile workshops.
Acres of agricultural land are being sold by farmers across the valley every day, as per the records in the registration offices. These are being converted for non-agriculture use.
"Unfortunately, the outskirts of Srinagar and other towns in the valley, which used to present a visual feast for the eyes, are today being deprived of their historic countryside ambience," Bashir Ahmad, 59, a retired veterinarian told IANS.
"Cities and towns are fast expanding laterally, gobbling up all the agricultural lands around," Ahmad lamented.
According to him, agriculture continues to be a largely non-profit- making activity in Kashmir and that is why farmers sell their ancestral lands to buyers who come with handsome offers.
"After all, a litre of water costs more than a litre of milk here. If we calculate the exact cost and the labour that goes into agriculture it is not a lucrative vocation at all," Ahmad said.
"I should know better because I belong to a family of middle class farmers," Ahmad asserted.
Land in the countryside is shrinking as developmental activities gather pace.
Roads are being widened, railway tracks are being laid and construction of hydro-electric power projects are in full swing. New office complexes and shopping malls are coming up. More schools and colleges are on the way.
The net result is that the cost of land has increased phenomenally in the Valley.
"A kanal of land (about 505 sq. metres) would sell for around Rs.20,000 in my village a few years back. Today it is priced at Rs.8 lakh," said Abdul Majid, 59, a resident of north Kashmir's Haripora village in Ganderbal district.
"This is quite tempting for a poor farmer who wants to sell the land and set up some business for his unemployed educated son," Majid pointed out.
Large chunks of agricultural land alongside the Srinagar-Leh national highway in Ganderbal, Haripora, Wussan, Manigam, Preng and Mamar villages have been sold to buyers from Srinagar and other places who are setting up business enterprises.
State Revenue Minister Raman Bhalla says the government has taken a serious note of the fact that agricultural lands are fast getting depleted. The conversion of agricultural land needs to be stopped, he said.
"The matter has been referred to a select committee of legislators which I am heading," Bhalla told IANS.
"Land is definitely needed for developmental purposes. However, land exclusively classified for agricultural purposes needs to be protected from being used for other purposes," he said.
Bhalla added: "We are in the process of legally banning such conversion. The government has taken it as a priority issue."
The minister also said because of the highly volatile law and order situation in the valley during the last 20 years, the government's focus was diverted.
"We already have stringent laws to protect agricultural land and it is the topmost priority of the government to make agriculture and allied activities profitable," he said.
Unless the state government moves in quickly, the coming generations will get to see Kashmir's lush green paddy fields, which turn into golden brown brilliance in autumn, only in photo albums.
Kashmir's Shrinking Farm Lands, Victim of Development?
Srinagar: Kashmir Valley gives a perfect image of lush, green countryside. But thanks to insatiable greed for money and dipping profits in agriculture, the fields of the valley would soon be buried under skyscrapers, factories and automobile workshops.
Acres of agricultural land are being sold by farmers across the valley every day, as per the records in the registration offices. These are being converted for non-agriculture use.
"Unfortunately, the outskirts of Srinagar and other towns in the valley, which used to present a visual feast for the eyes, are today being deprived of their historic countryside ambience," Bashir Ahmad, 59, a retired veterinarian told IANS.
"Cities and towns are fast expanding laterally, gobbling up all the agricultural lands around," Ahmad lamented.
According to him, agriculture continues to be a largely non-profit- making activity in Kashmir and that is why farmers sell their ancestral lands to buyers who come with handsome offers.
"After all, a litre of water costs more than a litre of milk here. If we calculate the exact cost and the labour that goes into agriculture it is not a lucrative vocation at all," Ahmad said.
"I should know better because I belong to a family of middle class farmers," Ahmad asserted.
Land in the countryside is shrinking as developmental activities gather pace.
Roads are being widened, railway tracks are being laid and construction of hydro-electric power projects are in full swing. New office complexes and shopping malls are coming up. More schools and colleges are on the way.
The net result is that the cost of land has increased phenomenally in the Valley.
"A kanal of land (about 505 sq. metres) would sell for around Rs.20,000 in my village a few years back. Today it is priced at Rs.8 lakh," said Abdul Majid, 59, a resident of north Kashmir's Haripora village in Ganderbal district.
"This is quite tempting for a poor farmer who wants to sell the land and set up some business for his unemployed educated son," Majid pointed out.
Large chunks of agricultural land alongside the Srinagar-Leh national highway in Ganderbal, Haripora, Wussan, Manigam, Preng and Mamar villages have been sold to buyers from Srinagar and other places who are setting up business enterprises.
State Revenue Minister Raman Bhalla says the government has taken a serious note of the fact that agricultural lands are fast getting depleted. The conversion of agricultural land needs to be stopped, he said.
"The matter has been referred to a select committee of legislators which I am heading," Bhalla told IANS.
"Land is definitely needed for developmental purposes. However, land exclusively classified for agricultural purposes needs to be protected from being used for other purposes," he said.
Bhalla added: "We are in the process of legally banning such conversion. The government has taken it as a priority issue."
The minister also said because of the highly volatile law and order situation in the valley during the last 20 years, the government's focus was diverted.
"We already have stringent laws to protect agricultural land and it is the topmost priority of the government to make agriculture and allied activities profitable," he said.
Unless the state government moves in quickly, the coming generations will get to see Kashmir's lush green paddy fields, which turn into golden brown brilliance in autumn, only in photo albums.
Some Good News For a Change
Reports indicate a 33% increase in exports of handicrafts
Handicraft Exports from J&K Touch All-Time High
Exports of handicrafts from Jammu and Kashmir has touched an all-time high of Rs 1,004 crore during the last fiscal, marking an increase of more than Rs 340 crore compared to previous year.
‘‘The state’s handicrafts export has touched an all-time high of R1,004 crore by March, 2011, as compared to R661.24 crore during the previous fiscal,’’ minister for industries SS Slathia said while reviewing the performance of the handicraft department here.
He said the government is mobilising all the resources to give boost to the sector which provides the livelihood to nearly four lakh people in the state. The minister also directed expeditious completion of the ambitious project to replace all the traditional looms with the modern looms at a cost of R1.20 crore.
So far, 39 looms have already been replaced by modern looms while the remaining 35 looms would be replaced by the end of next month.
"Government would explore all possibilities to provide free insurance cover to Below Poverty Level (BPL) artisans," the minister said.
State awards for outstanding artisans would also be revived from the current year to encourage artists to adopt handicrafts as a dignified profession, Salathia said.
(Press Trust of India)
Handicraft Exports from J&K Touch All-Time High
Exports of handicrafts from Jammu and Kashmir has touched an all-time high of Rs 1,004 crore during the last fiscal, marking an increase of more than Rs 340 crore compared to previous year.
‘‘The state’s handicrafts export has touched an all-time high of R1,004 crore by March, 2011, as compared to R661.24 crore during the previous fiscal,’’ minister for industries SS Slathia said while reviewing the performance of the handicraft department here.
He said the government is mobilising all the resources to give boost to the sector which provides the livelihood to nearly four lakh people in the state. The minister also directed expeditious completion of the ambitious project to replace all the traditional looms with the modern looms at a cost of R1.20 crore.
So far, 39 looms have already been replaced by modern looms while the remaining 35 looms would be replaced by the end of next month.
"Government would explore all possibilities to provide free insurance cover to Below Poverty Level (BPL) artisans," the minister said.
State awards for outstanding artisans would also be revived from the current year to encourage artists to adopt handicrafts as a dignified profession, Salathia said.
(Press Trust of India)
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