No Fault Of Mine
Dilip DSouza July 21, 2001
#836 Posted by mohajir on December 7, 2001 12:41:25 am
Hindu minority refuses to bow out of Kashmir
By Sonia Jabbar
NEW DELHI - Adding to the complexity of the ``Kashmir Problem`` which has dogged India and Pakistan for more than 50 years has been the fate of the minority Hindu population of Kashmir, otherwise known as the Pandits.
If little is known about the 300,000 Pandits who fled the Kashmir Valley between 1989 and 1991, at a time of popular support for militancy, to become refugees in India, less is known about the tiny number of 17,860 Pandits who chose not to leave.
The mass exodus of the Pandits is still shrouded in mystery. Why they left is a question still levelled at them by the Muslims of the valley.
``Tens of thousands of Kashmiri Muslims have died either at the hands of security forces or militants, but we are still here,`` says Shafi, an artist in Anantnag whose group of friends was almost entirely Pandit before the exodus. That there was a real, palpable fear among the Pandits of being exterminated is a fact dismissed by Shafi. He feels, like most Muslims, betrayed by them. They left without saying goodbye.
In Delhi, an old man`s sense of betrayal is of equal intensity. He was a government servant in Kashmir who trusted his Muslim neighbors. He feels they gave him no choice once the killings of the Pandits started in 1989, that they did nothing to allay his fears, that they drove him out of his homeland. ``I asked my Muslim friend why did you throw us out, why? Did we murder you? Did we rob you? Did we rape your women?`` he shouted, ``we taught you to read and write, we taught you . . . `` His friend, he said, had no answer.
The Pandits of Kashmir are all Brahmins, and pride themselves on being the only caste to have resisted conversion when Islam was introduced peacefully to the Kashmir Valley in the 14th century by the Sufis of Central Asia. They held considerable power, as they were the only people who had a tradition of being highly educated. But this also meant that they bore the brunt of the tyranny unleashed by certain ruthless invaders, particularly during the Afghan occupation of Kashmir in the mid-eighteenth century.
Even though the Kashmiri Pandits have had greater sympathies and links with the Indian Union than their Muslim counterparts, they bore severe economic losses after the Maharaja of Kashmir acceded to India when, in 1949, Kashmir`s leader Sheikh Abdullah introduced land reform measures, redistributing land largely held by the Pandits to the Muslim tiller.
``We have suffered at the hands of tyrants through history,`` says Yuvraj Raina, a Panun Kashmir activist in New Delhi. ``There have been four migrations of Pandits. This is the fifth, and the last.`` Panun Kashmir is an organization of Kashmiri Pandits formed in 1991 which believes that the only solution to the problems faced by Kashmiri Pandits is a separate homeland carved non-violently out of the Kashmir Valley.
This portion of the Valley, called Panun Kashmir, would be a secular state autonomous of Srinagar, and would abide by the Indian Constitution. They feel this is the only way to safeguard the interests, values and culture of the Kashmiri Pandit.
``Look, we told those who remained behind, it`s just a matter of time before they get you,`` says Raina. ``The Muslim fundamentalists want to ensure a pan-Islamic State from the Middle East and Central Asia to Kashmir and the world keeps quiet.`` He recounts the recent killings of the Pandits in the Valley - five last month, one more a couple of weeks later. ``We told them it is either homeland or perish.``
But this is not a sentiment shared by the Pandits who choose to remain in the Valley. In Mattan, south Kashmir, a young school teacher, Jyoti, continues to live with her family and extended family amongst her Muslim neighbors. ``This is the only home I`ve known. These are the only friends and neighbors I have ever had and they`ve been very good to us - so why should we leave?`` she asks.
``Yes, we do feel scared sometimes,`` she concedes. ``You see, no one knows anymore who the killers are. It`s not like the old days where everyone knew who belonged to which militant outfit. Now they are nameless, faceless.``
About the Pandit exodus she says, ``We never knew they were leaving. No one told us anything. In the evening they`d be chatting with us quite normally, perhaps a little afraid, and then the next morning we`d find a big lock on their front doors.``
The exodus of the Pandits has also meant that it becomes increasingly difficult for someone like Jyoti to find a suitable husband. In Srinagar there is a sizeable concentration of Pandits, but in rural areas there are barely a few families among the larger Muslim population. ``I really don`t know what I will do. My parents don`t want me to marry into a family who lives in some isolated hamlet. They`d worry for my safety. I suppose they`ll marry me off to someone in Jammu and I`d be forced to leave the Valley,`` she says quietly.
In Srinagar, the Hindu Welfare Forum, founded in 1991 to protect the interests of the Pandits who chose to remain behind, are an angry lot. They are visibly upset by the recent killings of the Pandits and fear another migration. ``Neither the state government nor the government of India has done anything to protect us. Nobody even knows we even exist. Neither the Indian media nor the international media has bothered to see how we live, highlighted our problems. Even our own community in India and abroad calls us traitors because we refused to leave,`` said a Forum member.
Apart from the myriad problems faced by this tiny community, they are a determined lot. Says Wanchoo, a businessman and a member of the Forum: ``We will never leave Kashmir, and we don`t believe in a separate homeland.
``This is our homeland and we wish to live in peace here. As for the killings, well it`s a problem faced by all Kashmiris, not just the Hindus. Everyday you read that 8-10 people have been killed and they`re usually Muslims. But the militants must realize that they only get discredited when they kill the minorities.``
His wife, who has lived through these terrible 12 years, witnessing much of the violence, experiencing much of the pain, relates a recent experience which makes her smile with delight and hope. ``At a wedding recently a whole lot of us had gathered after a long, long time - Muslim women as well as Sikh and Pandit women - and we really had fun, singing and dancing late into the night just as we used to before the militancy started.
``As I was turning in to sleep I heard the Muslim women whispering among themselves in the kitchen. `After so long,` they said, `after so many years all of us have come together`.
``It`s true, isn`t it, that a garden is most beautiful when there is a profusion of many kinds of flowers.``
By Sonia Jabbar
NEW DELHI - Adding to the complexity of the ``Kashmir Problem`` which has dogged India and Pakistan for more than 50 years has been the fate of the minority Hindu population of Kashmir, otherwise known as the Pandits.
If little is known about the 300,000 Pandits who fled the Kashmir Valley between 1989 and 1991, at a time of popular support for militancy, to become refugees in India, less is known about the tiny number of 17,860 Pandits who chose not to leave.
The mass exodus of the Pandits is still shrouded in mystery. Why they left is a question still levelled at them by the Muslims of the valley.
``Tens of thousands of Kashmiri Muslims have died either at the hands of security forces or militants, but we are still here,`` says Shafi, an artist in Anantnag whose group of friends was almost entirely Pandit before the exodus. That there was a real, palpable fear among the Pandits of being exterminated is a fact dismissed by Shafi. He feels, like most Muslims, betrayed by them. They left without saying goodbye.
In Delhi, an old man`s sense of betrayal is of equal intensity. He was a government servant in Kashmir who trusted his Muslim neighbors. He feels they gave him no choice once the killings of the Pandits started in 1989, that they did nothing to allay his fears, that they drove him out of his homeland. ``I asked my Muslim friend why did you throw us out, why? Did we murder you? Did we rob you? Did we rape your women?`` he shouted, ``we taught you to read and write, we taught you . . . `` His friend, he said, had no answer.
The Pandits of Kashmir are all Brahmins, and pride themselves on being the only caste to have resisted conversion when Islam was introduced peacefully to the Kashmir Valley in the 14th century by the Sufis of Central Asia. They held considerable power, as they were the only people who had a tradition of being highly educated. But this also meant that they bore the brunt of the tyranny unleashed by certain ruthless invaders, particularly during the Afghan occupation of Kashmir in the mid-eighteenth century.
Even though the Kashmiri Pandits have had greater sympathies and links with the Indian Union than their Muslim counterparts, they bore severe economic losses after the Maharaja of Kashmir acceded to India when, in 1949, Kashmir`s leader Sheikh Abdullah introduced land reform measures, redistributing land largely held by the Pandits to the Muslim tiller.
``We have suffered at the hands of tyrants through history,`` says Yuvraj Raina, a Panun Kashmir activist in New Delhi. ``There have been four migrations of Pandits. This is the fifth, and the last.`` Panun Kashmir is an organization of Kashmiri Pandits formed in 1991 which believes that the only solution to the problems faced by Kashmiri Pandits is a separate homeland carved non-violently out of the Kashmir Valley.
This portion of the Valley, called Panun Kashmir, would be a secular state autonomous of Srinagar, and would abide by the Indian Constitution. They feel this is the only way to safeguard the interests, values and culture of the Kashmiri Pandit.
``Look, we told those who remained behind, it`s just a matter of time before they get you,`` says Raina. ``The Muslim fundamentalists want to ensure a pan-Islamic State from the Middle East and Central Asia to Kashmir and the world keeps quiet.`` He recounts the recent killings of the Pandits in the Valley - five last month, one more a couple of weeks later. ``We told them it is either homeland or perish.``
But this is not a sentiment shared by the Pandits who choose to remain in the Valley. In Mattan, south Kashmir, a young school teacher, Jyoti, continues to live with her family and extended family amongst her Muslim neighbors. ``This is the only home I`ve known. These are the only friends and neighbors I have ever had and they`ve been very good to us - so why should we leave?`` she asks.
``Yes, we do feel scared sometimes,`` she concedes. ``You see, no one knows anymore who the killers are. It`s not like the old days where everyone knew who belonged to which militant outfit. Now they are nameless, faceless.``
About the Pandit exodus she says, ``We never knew they were leaving. No one told us anything. In the evening they`d be chatting with us quite normally, perhaps a little afraid, and then the next morning we`d find a big lock on their front doors.``
The exodus of the Pandits has also meant that it becomes increasingly difficult for someone like Jyoti to find a suitable husband. In Srinagar there is a sizeable concentration of Pandits, but in rural areas there are barely a few families among the larger Muslim population. ``I really don`t know what I will do. My parents don`t want me to marry into a family who lives in some isolated hamlet. They`d worry for my safety. I suppose they`ll marry me off to someone in Jammu and I`d be forced to leave the Valley,`` she says quietly.
In Srinagar, the Hindu Welfare Forum, founded in 1991 to protect the interests of the Pandits who chose to remain behind, are an angry lot. They are visibly upset by the recent killings of the Pandits and fear another migration. ``Neither the state government nor the government of India has done anything to protect us. Nobody even knows we even exist. Neither the Indian media nor the international media has bothered to see how we live, highlighted our problems. Even our own community in India and abroad calls us traitors because we refused to leave,`` said a Forum member.
Apart from the myriad problems faced by this tiny community, they are a determined lot. Says Wanchoo, a businessman and a member of the Forum: ``We will never leave Kashmir, and we don`t believe in a separate homeland.
``This is our homeland and we wish to live in peace here. As for the killings, well it`s a problem faced by all Kashmiris, not just the Hindus. Everyday you read that 8-10 people have been killed and they`re usually Muslims. But the militants must realize that they only get discredited when they kill the minorities.``
His wife, who has lived through these terrible 12 years, witnessing much of the violence, experiencing much of the pain, relates a recent experience which makes her smile with delight and hope. ``At a wedding recently a whole lot of us had gathered after a long, long time - Muslim women as well as Sikh and Pandit women - and we really had fun, singing and dancing late into the night just as we used to before the militancy started.
``As I was turning in to sleep I heard the Muslim women whispering among themselves in the kitchen. `After so long,` they said, `after so many years all of us have come together`.
``It`s true, isn`t it, that a garden is most beautiful when there is a profusion of many kinds of flowers.``
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#835 Posted by rsridhar on August 19, 2001 11:36:13 pm
Re:Reply #: 841
Truth,
Thanks for the clarification.
Sridhar
Truth,
Thanks for the clarification.
Sridhar
#834 Posted by harimau on August 15, 2001 1:53:14 pm
Ref YLH #: 844
[La Illah il Gandhi, Nehru Rasool Gandhi?]
Blasphemy!
Fatwa!
Stone this man to death!
[La Illah il Gandhi, Nehru Rasool Gandhi?]
Blasphemy!
Fatwa!
Stone this man to death!
#833 Posted by ZafarA on August 13, 2001 9:29:11 pm
Reply AAmir #845
I had suggested that it was in India`s interest to extend the same privileges to Bangladesh that it does to Nepal (free movement of goods and people), regardless of whether Bangladesh reciprocates or not (since we are already getting many BD people). I was convinced otherwise - ie that it needed to be reciprocal.
Zafar
Reply Sadna, Truth
Yup. I also remember when Runa Laila came to India. Wasn`t there some fanda with Latha Mangeshkar which cut her career there short? Truth, looking at my response it looks fairly curt, but that wasn`t my intention - I really WAS convinced, hence no need to argue a point, just to agree.
:-)
I had suggested that it was in India`s interest to extend the same privileges to Bangladesh that it does to Nepal (free movement of goods and people), regardless of whether Bangladesh reciprocates or not (since we are already getting many BD people). I was convinced otherwise - ie that it needed to be reciprocal.
Zafar
Reply Sadna, Truth
Yup. I also remember when Runa Laila came to India. Wasn`t there some fanda with Latha Mangeshkar which cut her career there short? Truth, looking at my response it looks fairly curt, but that wasn`t my intention - I really WAS convinced, hence no need to argue a point, just to agree.
:-)
#832 Posted by ylh on August 13, 2001 3:42:05 pm
Gowardhan,
I have come to the conclusion that there is no point to arguing with a fool like yourself, who is unable to accept the truth. Jinnah had begged Gandhi not to support the Khilafat Movement, but Gandhiji obviously knew better... since Gandhi ji is your God...
What is you Kalima Gowardhan?
La Illah il Gandhi, Nehru Rasool Gandhi?
I have come to the conclusion that there is no point to arguing with a fool like yourself, who is unable to accept the truth. Jinnah had begged Gandhi not to support the Khilafat Movement, but Gandhiji obviously knew better... since Gandhi ji is your God...
What is you Kalima Gowardhan?
La Illah il Gandhi, Nehru Rasool Gandhi?
#831 Posted by sadna on August 13, 2001 12:08:19 pm
Truth #842
Amen to that and to hopes for more cultural exchanges in particular! I am a fan of Runa Laila and I remember a particularly well-done dance drama presented in Dhaka at the very first (inaugural) summit of SAARC.
Not to mention Dhaka saris which manage to find their way(along with their salesmen) to the deepest Indian south :).
Amen to that and to hopes for more cultural exchanges in particular! I am a fan of Runa Laila and I remember a particularly well-done dance drama presented in Dhaka at the very first (inaugural) summit of SAARC.
Not to mention Dhaka saris which manage to find their way(along with their salesmen) to the deepest Indian south :).
#830 Posted by Truth on August 13, 2001 10:35:50 am
Zafar:
Just so as not to end our interactions on a note of stalemated Indo-Bangla relations, here`s a toast to stronger and stronger people to people relations between India and Bangladesh.
Just so as not to end our interactions on a note of stalemated Indo-Bangla relations, here`s a toast to stronger and stronger people to people relations between India and Bangladesh.
#829 Posted by Truth on August 13, 2001 10:35:50 am
Sridhar:
I think you are missing the point. First of all, Gandhi remained, throughout his life, a POLITICAL figure - he was never a STATE figure. What he did at prayer meetings did not in anyway suggest that he wanted a denominatinal STATE. Second, every human being, including President and Prime MInisters, are allowed to have a personal religion. They are free to visit their places of worship on a regular basis IN THEIR PERSONAL CAPACITY even when serving as President/PM. They can even occassionally visit a place of worship in their official capacity. What they cannot do is to pass and enforce laws that benefit a certain religion - this is the heart of secularism.
SECULARISM IS ABOUT THE LAWS AND THEIR ENFORCEMENT. It is NOT about what the PEOPLE who make the laws do with their time.
I think you are missing the point. First of all, Gandhi remained, throughout his life, a POLITICAL figure - he was never a STATE figure. What he did at prayer meetings did not in anyway suggest that he wanted a denominatinal STATE. Second, every human being, including President and Prime MInisters, are allowed to have a personal religion. They are free to visit their places of worship on a regular basis IN THEIR PERSONAL CAPACITY even when serving as President/PM. They can even occassionally visit a place of worship in their official capacity. What they cannot do is to pass and enforce laws that benefit a certain religion - this is the heart of secularism.
SECULARISM IS ABOUT THE LAWS AND THEIR ENFORCEMENT. It is NOT about what the PEOPLE who make the laws do with their time.
#828 Posted by ZafarA on August 13, 2001 12:29:13 am
Reply Truth, Layman, Sadna
OK, you have convinced me.
OK, you have convinced me.
#827 Posted by Gowardhan on August 13, 2001 12:29:13 am
[his efforts to use Khilafat Movement to isolate secular leadership of the Muslims]
Everybody is always conspiring against these guys. If Gandhi supported Khilafat Movement he was isolating the guy who himself chose to stay aloof. He had not supported Khilafat Movement, they would have accused him of not paying attention to a Muslim movement.
The habbit continues. After tricking the US into shelling out billions of dollars over the years, now US did all this to crush democratic movement in Pakistan. You speak to them, you are doing it to waste their time. Is their any hope for people who have such a mindset?
Everybody is always conspiring against these guys. If Gandhi supported Khilafat Movement he was isolating the guy who himself chose to stay aloof. He had not supported Khilafat Movement, they would have accused him of not paying attention to a Muslim movement.
The habbit continues. After tricking the US into shelling out billions of dollars over the years, now US did all this to crush democratic movement in Pakistan. You speak to them, you are doing it to waste their time. Is their any hope for people who have such a mindset?
#826 Posted by ylh on August 12, 2001 6:10:11 pm
Oh so now you are appreciating his efforts to use Khilafat Movement to isolate secular leadership of the Muslims? Khilafat Movement was a backward religious movement supported by Religious fanatics. Jinnah stayed aloof from the movement and viewed it as a very dangerous trend to bring Mullahs into Politics.
In any event if you people continue to condone Gandhi`s use of religion especially his usage of Hindu Vocab like Ram Rajya.... then be honest and fair... do not accuse of being wrong in using the mere political concept of Nation based on common religious customs.
-YLH
In any event if you people continue to condone Gandhi`s use of religion especially his usage of Hindu Vocab like Ram Rajya.... then be honest and fair... do not accuse of being wrong in using the mere political concept of Nation based on common religious customs.
-YLH
#825 Posted by harimau on August 12, 2001 2:28:31 pm
Ref ylh #: 830
[and please for god`s sake dont say Gandhi spoke of religion in general terms, for ram rajya will remain a Hindu religious term to the Muslims, no matter what the intentions behind it.]
Well, Gandhi also supported the Khilafat movement and no Hindu took it to mean that he was planning to establish the Khilafat-e-Hind.
[and please for god`s sake dont say Gandhi spoke of religion in general terms, for ram rajya will remain a Hindu religious term to the Muslims, no matter what the intentions behind it.]
Well, Gandhi also supported the Khilafat movement and no Hindu took it to mean that he was planning to establish the Khilafat-e-Hind.
#824 Posted by aicha on August 12, 2001 2:28:31 pm
Aamir - Nerves of Steel?? It might have escaped your attention but they dont do you any good unless you are a building or a telephone ka khamba. Cannot anyone ever interact in good fun w/o it degenerating into a question of faith?? I am quite dissappointed by all this!
aicha
ps.. the fact that I know a little Kannada/Tamil/Hindi doenst make me any less a muslim htan anyone else.
aicha
ps.. the fact that I know a little Kannada/Tamil/Hindi doenst make me any less a muslim htan anyone else.
#823 Posted by rsridhar on August 12, 2001 2:28:31 pm
Re:Reply #: 817
Truth,
I re-read your post and feel you are saying exactly what i have been trying to say. My arguments about secularism are still valid though.
Sridhar
Truth,
I re-read your post and feel you are saying exactly what i have been trying to say. My arguments about secularism are still valid though.
Sridhar
#822 Posted by rsridhar on August 12, 2001 2:28:31 pm
Re:Reply #: 817
Truth
Thanks for your post.
If you apply your definition of secularism (seperation of religion from church),which is a western definition anyway, Gandhi was not secular. He freely mixed religion with politics, which infuriated Jinnah to no end. He would regularly read, during his prayer sessions, from books of all religions viz Geetha, Koran, Bible. He would also talk about political situations in India and announce some importanct decisions during these prayer meetings. . Was Gandhi then really non-secular? No way. He was the most secular Indian you can ever find as he had deep understanding of all religions and treated them equally.
However,IMHO the above definiton need not be applied to Indian context. We need to find our own definiton depending on the social situation. If an average Hindu knew more about other religions like Islam, christianity, incidents like Babri Masjid could be avoided or even if it happens, we can discuss them rationally, without getting emotional. Where is the guarantee that another Babri incident will not happen if religion is seperated from church. Such things are done by politicians to garner votes and will continue to occur if people in one voice do not say NO.
Seperation of religion from State does not work in a country where a former President (Shanker Dayal Sharma)used to visit temples regularly even while he was President (nothing wrong, only made news headlines), ABV and many in his cabinet hobnob with religious saints like Sathya Sai Baba and so on. I hope you understand what i am trying to say. India is a deeply religious country and religion impinges on daily activities of common man and rulers alike. What is required is better understanding and not a law seperating religion from politics which is not enforcable anyway.
Sridhar
Truth
Thanks for your post.
If you apply your definition of secularism (seperation of religion from church),which is a western definition anyway, Gandhi was not secular. He freely mixed religion with politics, which infuriated Jinnah to no end. He would regularly read, during his prayer sessions, from books of all religions viz Geetha, Koran, Bible. He would also talk about political situations in India and announce some importanct decisions during these prayer meetings. . Was Gandhi then really non-secular? No way. He was the most secular Indian you can ever find as he had deep understanding of all religions and treated them equally.
However,IMHO the above definiton need not be applied to Indian context. We need to find our own definiton depending on the social situation. If an average Hindu knew more about other religions like Islam, christianity, incidents like Babri Masjid could be avoided or even if it happens, we can discuss them rationally, without getting emotional. Where is the guarantee that another Babri incident will not happen if religion is seperated from church. Such things are done by politicians to garner votes and will continue to occur if people in one voice do not say NO.
Seperation of religion from State does not work in a country where a former President (Shanker Dayal Sharma)used to visit temples regularly even while he was President (nothing wrong, only made news headlines), ABV and many in his cabinet hobnob with religious saints like Sathya Sai Baba and so on. I hope you understand what i am trying to say. India is a deeply religious country and religion impinges on daily activities of common man and rulers alike. What is required is better understanding and not a law seperating religion from politics which is not enforcable anyway.
Sridhar
#821 Posted by Layman on August 12, 2001 10:50:01 am
Truth #826:
``It seems to me that if Tamil Christians want to have a service in Tamil in Bangalore, it is their God given birthright. What right have Kannada speakers to complain? Have your own service! The oppressiveness of some majorities in India is really stifling.``
Maybe I did not state things clearly - the Kannada Christians did not protest against the use of Tamil in services. They protested against the absence of use of Kannada. I believe that the current situation is that both as well as other languages are used.
``It seems to me that if Tamil Christians want to have a service in Tamil in Bangalore, it is their God given birthright. What right have Kannada speakers to complain? Have your own service! The oppressiveness of some majorities in India is really stifling.``
Maybe I did not state things clearly - the Kannada Christians did not protest against the use of Tamil in services. They protested against the absence of use of Kannada. I believe that the current situation is that both as well as other languages are used.
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