“Mob is everywhere, we’re scared: In Dehradun, Kashmiri Students lock themselves in rooms fearing attacks,” said the headlines on my newsfeed. I blinked at the screen and smirked. And then the complexity and intent of what I had done dawned on me. In that unchecked moment I too had become an accomplice to that mob.
Last December, I had one of the most harrowing experiences of my life. I signed up for a six-week photography workshop in Srinagar. Week one was an initiation into life at subzero temperatures, with nine-hour power cuts and no heaters. By week two we had formed friendships. Personal accounts and historical narratives on the Kashmir conflict were an integral part of our conversations. From army atrocities to stories of humiliation and discontent, we were overwhelmed by what we heard. Yet, it surprised me how most of these accounts ended with a glorification of death. “Your terrorist is my freedom fighter” was the refrain.
By week three I was on the verge of depression. There were five encounters while I was in Srinagar. The nerve-racking images of wailing mothers, mass protests and bullet-riddled bodies haunted me. I wandered through the back alleys of downtown Srinagar, unable to buffer myself against the hate being spewed around me. Spray-painted signs of “India Go Back” stared at me, barbed wires decorated each tourist site.
The workshop brought no respite. Living with a bunch of photojournalists, not only was I privy to the images and sounds from the encounter sites, I also got to see a dark side to these narratives. Everybody, it seemed, loved a good conflict. The conflict was a goldmine and it gave in abundance. Like birds of prey my fellow classmates spoke of the unfolding events. I often found myself on the other side of the fence — an outsider. “If you want to work in Kashmir, carry your shroud with you,” a petulant classmate said to me.
By the time my husband arrived to join me at the end of the workshop last month, I had turned into a raging madwoman who just wanted to flee the place. All our walks, rides on the shikara and cups of kahwa no longer lured me. I was sullen throughout. To add to my misery, when the day of departure finally arrived, our flight got snowed in. The rest of the journey was a blurry ordeal of local trains, taxis and flights over a course of two days. What I do remember most poignantly though, was that, as the train to Banihal chugged out of Srinagar, my eyes welled up — I could no longer see the beauty of the snow.
I had fled, but Kashmir did not leave me. A week later I found myself talking incessantly about the Valley at a wedding. When I saw on TV the news of an avalanche, I secretly celebrated having escaped the heavy snow. Next came a mainstream movie based on the surgical strike, where I found myself rejoicing at the successful mission.
Something strange brewed inside me. It was no longer about the terrorist — there were several “others” I was defending myself against. I felt myself manufacturing an enemy. But who, I wondered. The attack in Pulwama finally showed me the horror of it all — somehow I had conjured up a community as an enemy, inciting my own prejudices. While I mourned the gruesome deaths of 41 soldiers, I also realised that just six weeks in a conflict zone had left a deep imprint on me.
The country stands polarised on what we need to do next. Belligerent talks of war flood my social media feed. Kashmiri students are being thrashed, kicked out of their houses and hounded by mobs. The terror being incited cannot be underestimated. The last few years have seen lynch killings, communal hatred and vengeful acts.
What have we become from who we were? After violence broke out following the assassination of Indira Gandhi in 1984, my grandfather sheltered a fleeing Sikh man in his bungalow in central India. He personally cooked and cleaned after him for several weeks before the climate of hate had receded and it was safe for him to go back. Years later, the Sikh man attended my grandfather’s funeral, leaving behind a most beautiful memory to cherish him by. In that fleeting second when I ignored the headline with a smirk, I stood against my most visceral family values. But let me not end there. This was not about a family but about an Idea of India that was collectively nourished.
So, I choose instead to dig deep and remember. For every personal attack and prejudice that I feel, I will choose to remember an act of love. I will remember the man who took me, by then hopelessly lost, past the “India Go Back” graffiti to his house for a cup of tea with his family. I will remember the footballer girl who hugged me and told me that not all Kashmiris want to pick up the gun; the imam who called for peace; the discussions with friends who showed me how afflicted the people were by post-traumatic disorders in this protracted inheritance of conflict.
And I will remember to show each Kashmiri that there is so much more to us too. That even as we mourn our dead soldiers, we will sow seeds of love and not harvest hate. To these terror-struck students I wish to show that there is an Idea of India which cannot be denounced in this rhetoric of hate. For every mob outside, there are thousands of safe houses. There is a Sikh man out there who can vouch for this.
Jennifer Kishan is a freelance writer and photojournalist based in Kolkata