Hearken To The Vale
By Mehran Qureshi
17 August, 2010
Countercurrents.org
Many years back, when armed insurgency was losing momentum in Kashmir’s resistance scene, there was a silent concern about the future of Kashmir. Of course, gun was getting us nowhere. And ‘they’, that is the state, always beseeched: give peace a chance. So, within a few years, the things started getting ‘normal’ again, as they said on TV channels. Peace was back in the valley and so was tourism. Almost.
In these brief years of ‘normalcy’, however, nothing was done to address the issue of Kashmir. No demilitarisation, no revocation of Draconian laws. If things were normal, what were 8 lakh troopers doing in the valley? Actually, the occupation is never passive. It always imposes itself upon the occupied. Rapes, murders, fake encounters, etc are the defining feature of occupied Kashmir. During 2008 land transfer row, Kashmir erupted as never before. The protests were peaceful. Only violence perpetrated was by the state authorities. The uprising left many dead.
The violence done to the fabric of Kashmir in last 20 years has irreversibly alienated it from India. In last couple of months, almost 60 people have been killed by armed forces, most of them teenagers and kids. The alleys of Valley are washed crimson almost every day. Kashmir is not bleeding, it is haemorrhaging. The youth, who have inherited this conflict, do not want this prolonged agony and humiliation. With nothing but stones in hand, people of Kashmir, including women and kids, come out to streets, to shatter the glass facades of criminal silence and neglect on part of civil societies and international community. Ironically, our spectacle does not have an audience. The pretentiousness of democracy becomes all more evident. Should we conclude that the world is dead?
Since last two months, curfew is imposed almost every day. People are being killed like game. Having already lost a generation, we stand the risk of losing one more to this conflict. More suppression will only make Kashmir erupt more forcefully. It’s as natural as Newton’s third law. I say hearken to Kashmir: it complains of brutality, suffocation and murder. Hearken to the voices of dissent; we might be able to save the future. Hearken or the past will invade our future.
Mehran Qureshi is a Kashmiri student of Architecture and often writes for various newspapers and magazines.
