I am a Kashmiri Pandit, 52 years old. There are two faces of my life. The first 25 years, I have spent in Kashmir and the later 27 years out of Kashmir in different parts of India in making my lively hood. While everywhere I stayed, I got lot of love and affection, but at the same time people asked me about my original native place, to which I proudly reply is “ I am a Kashmiri Pandit”. I belong to a village called Krangsoo which is just 6 kms from Distircit Anantnag connecting Famous Martand Temple via Goutamnag.

Since 1986 when in south Kashmir, most of the Temples were burnt, Kashmiri society by and large got divided on communal grounds. It became very difficult for Kashmiri Pandits to live there. Most of the ‘Majority community members’ either got influenced by hardliners and the militants who came across the border or were having a soft corner and provided safe shelter to them. This resulted in a sharp rise of militancy with violence like bomb blasts, kidnappings and processions on a day to day basis. The government, then was completely out of action and could not nab the militants in such situation. At this stage the local mosques largely used to propagate the message of Azadi and Pro Pakistan Propaganda. Every Friday was a day when Kashmir was expected to become a part of Pakistan and may attain Aazadi. Those true Kashmiris ( Hindus or Muslims) who raised voice against it were killed brutally. This included largely Hindus and some Majority community members as well under the category of Mukhabir etc. Circumstances were very difficult to survive for a Kashmiri Pandit, just for two reasons. One he had all throughout lived with his majority community brethren in peace and respecting each other’s religion but now people were openly claiming ‘Nizame Mustafah’ and Aazadi. Secondly, Kashmiri pandit women folks were getting raped, molested and murdered. This suffering and pain reached climax when on 19th Jan’1990 throughout Kashmir as people from ‘majority community’ came in Processions and wanted Kashmir Hindus too to participate in these processions as well as slogan shouting. Ultimatum notices were published in all the major newspapers and were also pasted on the doors of many Kashmiri Hindus and asking then for leaving Kashmir within 24 hours or face the consequences. All the above circumstances led to a mental trauma with a major contradiction and clash towards the life itself. This fear in our minds, uncertainty towards life and to protect the respect of our women folks, lead to mass exodus of Kashmiri Hindus to other parts of India and the remaining parts of World.

This part of the write-up is to describe specifically how me and my family left our home land which leaves me with a very sad feeling all the times. Having seen the exodus in Srinagar where I used to Work for Union Carbide then, post 19th Jan’1990, there were brutal killings and kidnappings took place including some industry veterans on every day. On one instance, I was locked up in the factory for about 3 days as the curfew was imposed throughout Srinagar City and its Outskirts. My father, was posted in CID wing of J & K Police had to go for site inspections post bomblasts and any such incidents led his name to appear in the hit list and the entire family was very worried and concerned about it. This left us with no choice other than to sort of get our father house arrested for about 2 months by hiding in the backside room of our newly constructed big house and also making him all the time ready in case some stranger knocks the door, he will run away from the back door and will be able to save himself (As many of his colleagues had been kidnapped, tortured and brutally killed, this was a quick fix to save the precious life of our beloved father) . This situation forced us to think and convince our father to leave our place where he cannot live, talk to his firends and move freely and is restricted to just one place although he has been living there for past 57 years through all thicks and thins of life. It was not an easy decision, however with little concern for his own welfare he was more worried about the protection and the respect of the women folks of our family in these uncertain and unsure conditions when every day a killing, torturous death of a Kashmiri Pandit besides rapes and molestation was a daily news. Even some of our neighbours of majority community brethren also asked us to leave the place in the good interest as they also got feared and such was the bond existing between the two communities. Finally we decided to leave our homeland thinking that within next 3 months we will be back.

It was 22nd April 1990, when me and my father on an early morning wearing a Pheran ( A traditional dress made up of woollen clothing’s and used during winter time ) and a towel on the shoulders left our home as if we are going to have a morning bath in a nearby river and from there we never looked back and reached Khanabal from where we boarded a bus and reached Jammu in the evening hours without knowing as where to go. We took along with us our pregnant Bhabi and my 3 year old niece, leaving back our mother, elder brother and his family and other elder brother there at Kashmir. While the intention was that situation will improve in about 2-3 months and then we will come back surely, alas! that never happened and we still dream the same. My father died with the same dream, Once we reached Jammu, it was sort of no-mans land for us as we did not knew what to do and where to go. In such a situation, I found one of my friend and a cousin, who offered us to be with them in a recently allotted tent at a Kashmiri Migrant Camp called Jadhi. Finally we reached the tent which was about 12 kms from Jammu jewel chowk. We had some food and were in a state of shock all along first few nights. Looking all around, It was a feeling which I could never forget during my life time. While we were completing a concrete big L Shaped house comprising of 3 sets and in which each one of the family members had his own room, here I was able to see that all of us about 9 members in the same tent. With electricity on and off throughout the night and in the morning, I realised that there is just one common toilet for the entire camp and every one had to go there and be in que to shit. Also for drinking water we had to remain in que for long hours after walking about 100 mts to get our turn and fill the pitcher/ plastic carbouy with water. The insects including Lizards, Snakes, Scorpio and Centipedes were very common and lot of Kashmiri pandits died due to these insect bites. Suddenly one would see a truck reaching the tent and people waiting besides the truck to get some eateries or blankets. All this was very difficult to imagine and believe that this could happen with us as a community and if we will not participate, we had nothing to eat. To get the Kerosene, one had to travel about 10 kms to the main city and remain in que in the scorching hot of Jammu in order to ensure that the stove is lit and we are able to cook food. Many Kashmiri Hindus died of Sun stroke as we were never exposed to such a hot summer temperatures. It was on one night, I found a snake passing above my niece’s body and all of us were so frightened and in a sad state of depression again such poisonous snakes are not very common in Kashmir. Thus there was a cultural shift which one had to quickly adopt to make sure that he /she is able to reconcile besides his own struggle for living a normal life anywhere.

In these conditions while, we were trying to find the pros and cons of our decision of leaving the so called Paradise on earth for protecting the respect of our women folks, sticking to patriotism , giving up all the luxury and comfortable life and expecting to go back at the earliest , we were going through turbulent and tough times and acute mental trauma . It was in those conditions we spend about first 5 years trying to adapt, reconcile and with a strong hope that thinking that the rest of India would come forward and support us whole heartedly, would never leave us alone and would do everything till Kashmiri Pandits are settled back in their own home land, which is always incomplete without them. Again we were left to our own miseries and world remained a salient spectator?

I am still wondering whether this will ever happen, while we kept waiting and waiting and 25 years passed, no one even bothered about us, not to think of returning the awards and creating hue and cry by visiting our shelter homes in Jammu or Delhi and very surprisingly not even media. A price we paid for being true Indian and being a minuscule Hindu community whose votes does not matter at all in Indian Politics and a community who had courage and patience to remain silent, tolerant and quiet yet resilient and stood by all even and odds to make their presence felt once again if not through sheer numbers however through contribution to the society at large in every field (Govt, Public & Private) without knowing the world that such tragedy took place 25 years ago. Proudly, someone told me that only this community could do it! While my father developed Cancer due all the above explained mental trauma as unlike me he could not adjust to the cultural shift ( being little elderly) and left us for heavenly abode about 15 years back, we are still hopeful. Let us hope that one day we go back and proudly live there as a Kashmiri Pandit without any fear, violence and with mutual respect. The only thing that will make us go back to our native place is abrogation of article 370 from Jammu and Kashmir state. We all can live happily there In Kashmir, The paradise on earth.

By Iqbal Krishen Pandit

A KASMIRI LIVING IS EXODUS SINCE 1990

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