Reflections on Kashmir

I decided to come to Kashmir last year after talking to Kashmiri merchants all over India. My traveling companion and I have been in Srinegar and area since April first of this year. The thing about Kashmir for Canadians is that the climate, topography and flora are so similar to temperate areas of Western Canada, such as the Gulf Islands, interior BC, the Coast. “Super Natural BC” as the ads declare ad nauseum. The roofs are steeply pitched to shed snow. There is an immediate sense of familiarity from the physical setting. Catching up on the differences in culture, temperament and politics is a much slower process. I just find the longer I stay, the more I dread having to leave. I struggle to find words to encompass the whole of my complex reactions to this place. The simplest thing I can say is that I love Kashmir as much for her sorrows as for her beauty.

I sensed the first tendrils of that sorrow last year in Goa, in the far off gaze and quiet sadness of an older man's profile as he tells me how beautiful the mountain water is. His yearning is a palpable thing.

In Puttaparthi earlier this year a young Kashmiri man tells me how at night when they were kids they would hide in their silent dark house listening to the quiet “phut phut” of rifle bullets down the road.

“And the old folks were all huddled together and trembling,”

“My mother begged me to get out of Kashmir, to go to Delhi to work when I was seven years old because Kashmir was too dangerous.”

“The schools were burnt and the teachers fled”.

Voices of Kashmir, slow, soft and halting, sorrows out of the past are still very fresh and painful for those who lived through them and were scarred and/or made stronger by them.

That was 18 years ago. Today; the scent of roses is the first thing I experience as I walk out of the door of my guest house everyday. The entire yard and pathway to the street are lined by the kind of roses I have only ever seen in florist's before, elegant and eloquent blooms. Honey suckle leans over and softens the 8 foot high brick walls that line every inch of the riot proofed streets.

A house boat, rather like a hundred years old, completely wooden, single wide trailer floating on the lake, smells exactly like our old summer cottage on a somnolent summers day. The light and air stream unhindered through the comfortably shabby but still elegantly furnished living/dining room from three sides. Lots of books sitting on the book rack beside the couch. An invitation to lazy guilt free relaxation. If you want to go over to the shore, a shakira will show up eventually. You are on Indian time now, just chill and turn off the Blackberry.

Throughout the city sandbagged machine gun emplacements guard strategic intersections, encircled by concertina rolls of razor wire. Soldiers pat me down and confiscate my cigarettes and matches when I go into the post office.

The army removed the garrison quartered in the old fort on the top of the hill and told the city it could restore it to it's roster of historic monuments. When civilians get back into it again they discover that the Hindu and Sihk temple are clean and well cared for but the Mosque has been used as a toilet by the soldiers and the 400 year old Parsi script decorating the walls and arches has been scratched off and defaced. When indignant citizens wish to hold a press conference to complain about this vandalism, both they and the reporters who respond are arrested. Shop keepers throughout the whole downtown and in the Dall Market close their shutters for a day in a sympathy strike.

It's definitely an occupied city, any protest is met with immediate armed force, any complaint with censorship, swat teams roam the streets with their fingers on the trigger of their assault rifles. People disappear, unidentified bodies are discovered in the graveyards. An Indian officer who captures a militant get one lahk rupees and a boost in rank. His mistakes get buried. A sign on a fence asks “What price Kashmiri blood?” One lahk rupees apparently. Kashmiris still protest, some very judiciously, others not so wisely. Remi and I find a couple of syringes lying beside the path one day. There is widespread unemployment and serious cases of depression and post traumatic stress disorder. There is a huge orphanage towards the outskirts of town. Young educated people mourn the lack of “ a real job” and struggle to get an Indian passport so that they can leave India and find work abroad. No cabin baggage in the airplane to Delhi.

Chinnar, at another Internet shop shows me some of the exchanges he has been having with a lady on the Thorn Tree about Dall Lake water quality. I introduce him to Indiamike. Another man tells me how he loaned his scooter every day to a biologist writing a thesis about Dall Lake, and shook his head ruefully as he told me that every evening the guy left the bike with more gas in the tank than when he took it out. “He didn't have to do that!”

India borrowed money for four floating water treatment machines from the World Bank and bought one old second hand machine to fight the growing problem of blue green algae in Dall Lake.

It's a bitch getting home after dark if the power goes out. The path heaves and buckles like a broken backed snake with the water hazard of small sewage ditches around every twist and turn. It's great during the day to see how each individual section of the path has been surfaced by completely different styles of stone, tile and brickwork, a visual feast, but its an ankle breaker in the dark.

The tourist retail sector is flat lined. Many shop keepers have lost their businesses. Any tourist unlucky enough to be in a shikira in front of the first rank of houseboats is mobbed on the water by hoards of sales men with goods that are 30 to100 percent more expensive than they can buy on the street shops. Houseboat tourists are warned to stay away from “those guys on the street” by the shakira paddlers and the houseboat owners. The shop keepers, all around the Internet shop Remi and I use, cringe every time some hapless tourist tells them about being fleeced by a rapacious houseboat owner. They are shamed and disappointed. Another dissatisfied possible customer who probably won't be back next year.

And that's a shame, because Shrinegar is a fabulous place to shop. The big push is in wholesale. Really big deals are going down on shipments to India and abroad as Kashmiri merchants stock up on their fall and winter merchandise, shawls, jewelry, carpets, walnut, painted boxes. There are warehouses full of goods destined for the export market. There are street markets selling any kind of consumer goods you might want to purchase, from digital cameras to very lovely porcelain tea sets. Kashmiris drink their tea out of cups with handles, very small, demitasse size, not tin cups or glass shot glasses like the rest of India. The streets are clean, the quality of merchandise is good, shops have great assortments of goods, food and produce is fresh and attractive.

And there are still even a few remnants of the old elegance of the last days of the British Raj left in Shrinegar. I order a Saville Row style suit from a shopkeeper, K. Saladan, whose family has been dressing British, Canadian and American military officers, United Nations delegates and even the High Commissioner for Australia since the forties. He even recognized the name of Tip Top Tailors in Edmonton from conversations with Canadian officers. He's planning to sell off his stock of fine Kashmir, Scottish, British and Australian suitings by auction because his son will not continue the business after him. His tailors are in their sixties to eighties, one is 95 years old. It's an end of an era. Even Saville Row doesn't make suits like that anymore.

The whole street is full of shops selling very high quality goods such as leather coats for a fraction of what they would cost in Canada. You can get shoes hand made to fit just your feet. And the chinnar trees that shade the street, maples to us, are six feet in diameter through the trunk.

Shrinegar is like a fine Swiss watch that has been left out in the rain. It would be so nice to see it cleaned up and working again, but from what I have heard about corruption in government, that does not seem to be what India wants for Kashmir. Rather it seems that what both India and Pakistan want is a docile, resource and labor rich hinterland to exploit with impunity, rather like the United States' relationship with the Canada. And Kashmiris, like Canadians, can either like it or leave it.

I love Kashmir as much for her sorrows as for her beauty.

"Shrinegar is like a fine Swiss watch that has been left out in the rain. It would be so nice to see it cleaned up and working again,"

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Heartfelt post, snowcrab, but, if I may say so, quite one sided.

But the issue of Kashmir, and its situation today, cannot be meaningfully thrashed out over a few keyboards anyway, so I will not elaborate.

It's difficult as Indians to see it neutrally. Kashmir is "occupied" by India is not a sentiment which goes down well. From history, the story 'appears' to be one of finders keepers.

I say 'appears' because that was what I was taught in school textbooks. & we all know every country's heritage is written in a manner, that they're all fine upstanding folks on the side of righteousness.

I could say a lot more but it would be sedition.

Hi Allan and DD, Thanks for responding:

I agree with both of you. Allan, Give me break, I've been in love with the place for a month, takes more time than that to tell the tail.

And DD, well some of us girls call it "His" story already, and yes history is written by the victors, but the victor has yet to be determined at this point.

Snowcrab, with all due respect, I continue to be amazed by your posts ....I would suggest read up on Kashmir... any version except the LET's , before making comments which are downright incorrect and inflammatory.

To suggest that there is a war over the status of Kashmir still to be won is like saying Quebec is a disputed territory.. ridiculous. Kashmir has been a part of India for 60 years.

And, the army excesses, minor compared to the excesses of the Pakistani terrorists, are subject to the law. The Indian army is not a banana republic militia. The same army returned 90000 Pakistani prisoners of war after the 1971 Bangladesh vicotry, safely and without harm.

I can only assume your naivete for an area you loved is showing, is all.

salaam hi thnaks for sending this great thread please keep it up.many thanks to your good self for helping me with getting in Indimike!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!wi th prayers for global peace Chinar

Look, that's the thing. By your definition, there is a 'war' there while we're claiming 'infiltration'. All said and done, they're Indians and they're dying or IMO murdered by militants. I presume, you know of all the Kashmiri pandits who have been ethnically evicted from J&K?

This would have been solved militarily decades ago except for the 'realpolitik' Kissenger who thought the Pakistan would make a great friend. That was a smart move, wasn't it? Even smarter was the Indian Leadership listening to the Americans.

Knuckleheads all around.

Now, it's a basket case taking the region around it down by selling nuclear weaponry to all and sundry. Irony is, Israel is now on a powder keg of nuclear politics with Iran(supplied by Pakistan) with the deep stupidity of Kissenger, a zionist.

Fcuking Brilliant.

With friends like these.....

I enjoyed the post though it could have used an outline. Do keep in mind it is occupied after ethnic cleansing that violently chased away non Hindus. Do we really need more Irans and Israels.?

These people were Kashmiri Hindu Pundits who were ethnically cleansed by Islamists backed by Pakistan!

So hold your high... for another issue,


...and read up on Kashmir.

Lovely post Snowcrab, I am well excited about going there later this year.
Thanks for taking the timeout to do such a lengthy post.

Maz

Somewhat reflecting Captain Mahajan's sentiments on the original post - sensitive, heartfelt, but one sided and lacking balance.

I personally do not subscribe to 'do not yield an inch on Kashmir' view and would like to see the situation resolved speedily, even if the resolution requires India to eat some bitter medicine and leads to Kashmir's succession from India. That noted, the ethnic cleansing of Hindus from Kashmir and very deliberate and effective destabilization strategies pursued from the Pakistan side are very much a part of the picture. And, the terrorist targets have not been limited to central Indian interests, but have very much included moderate/center elements in Kashmiri politics is an attempt to rule out centrist solutions.

It is indeed very sad to see Indian citizens of Kashmiri origin treated with suspicion and singled out for scrutiny. And, it does indeed cause the feeling of alienation and lack of belonging (to India), but it is also an unfortunate part of the picture in a terroristic insurgency. The excesses on the part of the army are also an unfortunate part of the same. Snowcrab ought to look into the tactics of Canadian/Nato contingent in Afghanistan. Lacking ability to discern Taliban from regular peace-loving Afghans - the level of scrutiny the regular Afghans are subjected to and the collateral deaths of civilians are perhaps not much different. And, chances are that the terroristic elements involved on both Afghanistan and Kashmir got their training in the same place.

In all, it is a terribly sad situation in need of an early solution. But one sided views do not exactly serve the right purpose.

Well, actually I got a chance to get another sides' view. I went up for my ritual evening tea with a friend of mine. His shop is on the third floor. As I came to the second landing I saw soldiers, more soldiers in his store. The Captain behind the desk introduced himself and showed me the very nasty wound to his knee he had received while chasing militants through the countryside. I can understand his point of view to a certain extent. He risked his life to protect people, who eighteen years later do not appear to be very greatful. That is a legitimate feeling, shared I'm sure by many Indians.

However, if the territory is quiet and secure nothing happening on his watch downtown, although he did mention there were minor skirmishes out in the boondocks almost every night,why the razor wire, sandbag forts and all that stuff that makes the place look like it's ready for an immediate incursion of fierce Pathan horsemen waving scimitars and yelling blood curdling slogans? Either the place is quiet or it isn't and military style censorship and interogation styles are needed or they aren't. Eighteen years is a long time.

The quotes from Kashmiris I noted were from people who still have families living in Kashmir whom they regularly visit this time of year, although they work in other parts of India the rest of the year.

All of the Kashmiris I have talked to, except one person who professed himself a supporter of a free Kashmir, want to have friendly and profitable trading ties with India, even the one guy still wanted trade. Haven't met any flaming radicals or militants yet, suspect they would't talk to me. Everybody else would just like life to get back to normal, get rid of the guns and razor wire, get the tourists back, have some fun, make some money. Very patient sad people.

Yes. Thats the tragedy too. For a people who always depended heavily on tourism, this is a big blow, and has been so for twenty years. They are akin to daily wage earners, and seasonal too.

I have spent months in Kashmir over many years. Paradise. Some of us who rave about Uttaranchal and Himachal today (including me), have no idea.

Unfortunately, because of the special status given to Kashmir by the Indian Constitution, the terrorism, the forced migration of Pandits, the army presence and neglect by earlier Central Governments, almost no investment has trickled into the Kashmir valley. So no jobs.

Even right now, its a chicken and egg situation. Which one first?

Have you considered that the reason the place seems quiet is because of the razor wire, sandbag forts, etc.?