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| Lal Chowk of Srinagar is Red Square of Russia | | | M.K. Mattoo
Srinagar "The city
of goddess Lakshmi"
with its legendary and historical background has enjoyed the distinction of being the capital of the Happy Vale of Kashmir for more than two thousand years. Kalahana, the author of the Rajatarangini (the stream of Kings of Kashmir) mentions that Srinagar was founded by Ashoka. His son Jaluka extended it beyond Aitagaji (Gupkar) and built the shrine of Jyestharudra (Jethyar).Srinagar is the Summer Capital of Jammu & Kashmir & Lal Chowk is City Centre and a Commercial hub.
The present city of Srinagar founded by parvarasena-II in the beginning of the 6th century of the Christian era, around 72 A.D and known as pravarapura was practically contiguous to the old city of Srinagri and existed side by side for centuries. The name pravarpura is also recorded in the Chinese T'ang Annals. It is found in the works of Khsemendra and Bilhana and is still used in the colophons and horoscopes of Brahmins to the present day. Hiuen Tsang who visited the capital in about 631 A.D. found the city already in the position of the present capital. He describes it as being situated along the right bank of the great river vitasta (Jelhum) extending about four Kms from north to south and about a Km and a half from east to west. The banks of the river are low, and the ground on which city stands is low. The Jhelum makes along bend through the town and it is environed intersected by numerous canals and water-courses.
Forster records that when he visited the city it was known by the name of the province at large, its present appellation is generally supposed to signify "the town of Surya, or the Sun", or it may be derived Sri, Shri, a title of Lakshmi, the wife of Vishnu, and goddess of prosperity, and mean the 'fortunate city'.
If Jama Masjid and Hazratbal are Kashmir's religious keepers, Lal Chowk is its political soul. Every event or non-event here grabs the state's attention. It was at this chowk that Jawaharalal Nehru unfurled the national flag in 1948. It was here that he promised Kashmiri's a referendum to choose their political future. He had by his side Omar Abdullah's grandfather, Sheikh Abdullah, who quoted a Persian verse "Man Tu Shudi, Tu Man Shudi, Ta Kas Na Goyed, Man Degram Tu Degri (I became you and You became I; so none can say we are separate)". Five years later, the Sheikh was in prison for conspiring against India and Nehru said a referendum was "impractical". Shri Jawahar Lal Nehru who would make many trips to Kashmir every year did not come even once since May 1953 to 1957. Why? Abdullah shook his confidence. Nehru kept his word given in the shake hand at Lal chowk when the Indian Army took up the defence in 1947.
Lal Chowk was named so by Left-wing activists inspired by the Russian Revolution as they fought Maharaja Hari Singh. This was Kashmir's Red Square, the place where every politician and ideology cut their teeth. "Lal Chowk Chalo" has the same ring here as Subhash Chandra Bose's "Dilli Chalo". It was at this square that Sheikh Abdullah explained his 1975 accord with Indira Gandhi to a crowd rivaled only by his funeral procession in 1982.
Then came militancy in 1989. There is an interesting anecdote of 1990-the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front had placed a colour TV set at Lal Chowk and dared anyone to unfurl the Tri-colour there and walk away with the set. A Srinagar-based national Security Guards detachment took up the challenge and raised the flag. For years the TV set was a trophy displayed at its officer' mess.
When discontent was peaking, the Lal Chowk clock tower built in 1980 by Bajaj Electriclas was the destination of the October 11march. It was Eid and chief minister Omar Abdullah had told the police, come what may, no firing. The mob burnt the crime branch office, shouting "Chalo Lal Chowk" all the while.
Bhartya Janta Party supporters from all parts of the country are raising the same battle cry.
This yatra brings back memories of Murli Manohar Joshi's 1992 original Ekta Yatra charade. The city was under curfew as Joshi and a handful of supporters were flown in.
Layers of security men protected them as they gingerly walked to the flag post at Lal Chowk and quickly unfurled the flag. They were bundled into bulletproof cars and rushed back. An unknown RSS pracharak called Narendra Modi accompanied Joshi that day.
But this analogy is only half accurate. The BJP's fascination with Kashmir dates back longer. In 1953, Bharatiya Jan Sangh founder Syama Prasad Mookerjee died after his arrest on trying to enter Kashmir. In those days, no one could enter the state without permission from the Prime Minister of Kashmir. Mookerjee's slogan was: "Ek desh mein do vidhan, do pradhan, do nishan, nahi chalega, nahi chalega(one country cannot have two constitutions, two prime ministers or two flages)." Now when there is talk of pre-1953 status as a solution to the Kashmir problem, this slogan and its resonance might serve as a warning. The BJP might never reach Lal Chowk but Prime Minister Narendra Modi's rally in Srinagar on 8th December 2014 during the election campaign rally in Sher-E-Kashmir stadium in a modest crowd is evident.It was an act of daring for a Hindu nationalist party to organize one in the heart of valley nearer to Lal Chowk a commercial and political hub of the Kashmir. Mr. Modi stood on the dais without the protection of a bullet proof enclosure. He added a glorious chapter in the history of the Kashmir by reaching in the centre city Lal Chowk, of the capital.
It will not be out of place to say that the year 2014 was the luckiest one for the BJP. The author has seen some of the pseudo-political analysts saying that "the BJP failed to translate their Mission 44+. Let us not bypass this stark reality that the Kashmir Valley, where once upon a time, even hoisting the tri-colour national flag was not even a distant possibility, was reverberating with the BJP slogans and dotted with the Lotus Symbols all around.
Just down the memory lane, when this particular clock tower was erected in Lal Chowk some four decades earlier, the (Indian) name "BAJAJ", prominently displayed on two sides of the said tower (with a running clock on other two sides) was removed within days of its installation by the Islamic fundamentalists. So Lal Chowk was the hub of Islamic fundamentalism then and no wonder it continues to be the same now as well. The night-long terror attacks in this area are quite fresh in our minds. The call for strikes and shutdown by the separatists groups on arrival of Mr. Modi to Kashmir had evoked a partial response in valley, although most shops in and around the city centre-Lal-Chowk-the commercial hub of summer capital, were due to flood closed but media said that all the establishments and transportation were closed at Lal-Chowk due to call given by the separatists. The separatist used this place since for their political existence. |
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