Azad Hussain
As soon as my friend began to reply me , “something untoward has happened” while he was browsing internet on his handset, after I asked him “why the cops stopped our vehicles?”, instantly I saw some media persons updating live infront of our car about the incident which had happened just a few minutes before at Lethpora with a short distance away from us. It was extremely horrific when we came to know about the dreadful news that a suicide bomber had taken away the lives of dozens of CRPF personnels along with him who were traveling in buses on the same national highway from Jammu to Srinagar, that we too were traveling through but from the opposite side. The incident which was later made a reason by outsiders, who were perhaps politically motivated, to target Kashmiris. This all happened in the afternoon of February 14 while me and my friend like many others were on the way traveling from Srinagar (the summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir) to our home district Anantnag, then some cops stopped us and other vehicles at the famous safron fields near Pampore just after the incident had happened.
However that time, we were lucky enough that the difference of a very short distance, from the incident site to us provided us a lifeline to survive. Had our departure four minutes earlier from Srinagar, it would have been biggest misfortune for us. As in Kashmir where the wild death dance is prevailing violently, Kashmiris are always seen at high risk round the clock from all sides, who don’t know when and where they would get trapped in such kind of situations where the possibility of danger prevails instantly. After stopping for half an hour, we and other stranded people, as asked by cops, choosed an alternative route through Pulwama to reach home. Near Kakpora a few Kilometres away from Galandher , we got trapped in a traffic Jam on a bottlenecked link road leading to Anantnag with various other vehicles. Meanwhile our worried families got very much concerned and started asking us about our safety on phone frequently and same would have been the case with other stranded people. Being unfamiliar with the route within the tensed circumstances my friend compelled me to return back to national highway with the hope that traffic would be restored again there safely till late evening. But after waiting for about one and half an hour at National Highway we again were told by by cops on duty to choose back the same link road through Kakpora to reach home. Now it was during night hours we were driving through a strange and fearful route. And finally we managed to reach home by late night safely.
Such are the circumferences you oftenly come to experience here in Kashmir. People leave home for the daily routined work with no hope whether they would reach home safely by evening or not. People in Kashmir have been trapped in a net of suspicions in both the cases whether they would step out from their homes here in their own homeland Kashmir or they would move around outside the Kashmir and are asked for identity, frisked and questioned frequently. Be they soldiers or militants both have waged a war against each other with the result you come to see piles of dead bodies the day in and day out here in Kashmir, consequently, in between several innocents common Kashmiris suffer, and sometimes become the victims. Lethpora was a same kind of incident was near about fifty cops along with a suicide bomber died.
This death dance in Kashmir needs to be stopped through a meaningful reachout to the alienated people which is not possible with the help of gun but with a meaningful dialogue. As Kashmiris have been seeing this bloodshed since decades. But every Kashmiri regrets the Killings irrespective of religious or regional belongingness of the dead. But it disheartens you when you see the some people of India taking revenge of Lethpora attack from Innocent Kashmiris who are outside the valley with study related or business related purposes that too under the nose of government authorities. It pains you more when you see some responsible people in government provoking the goons to attack Kashmiris, then terming them nationalists. The irony is that you call those nationalists, who set ablaze the vehicles of Innocent people from other minority religion and beat them to pulp for none of their sins.
In this way the people of India proclaiming it’s country the biggest democracy in world have once again attempted to break all those few leftover delicate threads of communal harmony which were still intact because of some peace lovers. Better it would be, if people would let peace to prevail. On the other hand Kashmiries have set countless examples to welcome the visitors and Amarnath yatries with human heart here in Kashmir that too in the midst of violence, who come from India every year. However after the Lethpora episode when Kashmiries were made soft targets in India, it was heartning that the Sikh brothers and the people from Gujjar and Bakarwal Communities have come forward to rescue Kashmiries and offered a helping hand to them in every respect at the time of their distress. In various places outside the valley Sikh Communities have managed food and shelter for those Kashmiris who were in distress after being harrassed by some politically motivated groups of people in the aftermath of Lathpora incident. And a same example was set by the Gujjar and Bakarwal Communities at Bathandi Jammu who offered free food and shelter to Kashmiris for several days. In return Kashmiris have acknowledged the help of Sikh, Gujjar and Bakarwal Communities in India, and have thanked them for reaching out to Kashmiris at their ill-fated juncture, by showing the true image of humanity to world. By the people of Kashmir, the social media was filled up with bundles of thanks to Sikh, Gujjar and Bakarwal Communities for the great role they played.
(The author is a freelancer. Views are his own [email protected])
