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| Exodus of K Hindus & execution of Guru | | Two faces of Pandita | | Neha
Jammu, Feb 12: Only a few days ago, a migrant from Kashmir and Delhi-based journalist Rahul Pandita came out with an "excellent" book on the circumstances leading to the exodus of the miniscule minority of Kashmiri Hindus from the Valley in early 1990, as also on the nature of the ongoing secessionist movement there and Kashmiri leadership. The book is titled "Our Moon Has Blood Clots". It recounts in minute detail about the "conspiracy" hatched by the "majority community" to rid the Valley of "an erudite, enlightened minority" (read Kashmiri Hindus), so that the fanatics could establish "an independent Islamic state". It also catalogues in detail the atrocities perpetrated on his community by the majority community as well as the "mass uprising" against the Indian state which, according to him, led to the migration "in the stealth of night" and forced it to seek shelter under the "Indian flag".
His critics, another Delhi-based Kashmiri Hindu journalist Pradeep Magazine, who is known for his friendly relations with Kashmiri separatists, was so perturbed over what he has written in his book that he wrote a critique on the book and lambasted Pandita. He accused him of distorting, twisting and suppressing facts of history with a view to painting the majority community as communal and black and countered his view that it was the majority community and its anti-India and anti-Hindu activities which had forced the minority community to quit Kashmir and asserted that the majority community is genuinely secular, liberal and democratic.
In fact, he wrote: "Right from the 1960s, when my (Magazine) memory of that place started taking root, the social chasm between the two communities was deep: we were not allowed to eat in their homes and they were not allowed to enter our kitchens, for that would have 'polluted' us. Yet both communities lived in peace, respecting each other's space. In my adult memory, the man who indulged me, placated my unjust, obdurate, fanciful demands was a Muslim servant, who still holds a warm, fond place in my heart. My father, like the majority of Pandits over the years, had to leave his home and work in 'India' because there were no jobs for the 'educated' in the Valley, regardless of their religion. Unlike Mr. Pandita's story of the 1947 Kabali raid (tribal attack from across the border), where he limits his narrative to the persecution of Hindus, my father, a great admirer of Sheikh Abdullah, would never tire of telling us how he was witness to the mass gathering at Lal Chowk where Abdullah gave his speech, while the crowd raised slogans "Shere-Kashmir ka kya irshad, Hindu, Muslim, Sikh ithaad" (What does the Lion of Kashmir want? The unity of Hindu, Muslim and Sikh). In those three days of anarchy, it was Sheikh Abdullah's secular vision, which the majority of Muslims believed in and acted upon, that saved the Hindus. 1931, for Mr. Pandita, is not the year in which at least 36 Muslims were killed during the mass uprising against the tyrannical Dogra rule, but only of the looting of shops that belonged to his own community…" He also wrote: "The fact that under Dogra rule, Hindus connived with the king to subjugate the Muslims - which many historians see as the genesis of the present problem - is neither part of Mr. Pandita's memory nor his history. How and why did Buddhism get wiped out of Kashmir? What was the role played by the Shaivite Brahmins, whose progeny we are, in that cleansing? Wasn't the egalitarian message of the Sufis one of the reasons for the mass conversion of all backward classes and Dalits, suffering from the oppressive Brahminical caste order? Why do Hindus in the Valley comprise of only Brahmins?"
Such was the blistering attack of Magazine on Pandita. The former did his best to prove Pandita wrong and dismissed his whole approach as biased, communal and regressive. Countering Magazine, Pandita wrote: "Mr. Magazine may want to retain his rosy image of the Kashmir of the 1960s, but the Pandits faced brutality in 1990, in which a very large number of Muslims took active part. Denying this reality that many of us faced will not help anyone move on. Please do not insult our memory. Please do not lie by writing not a single Pandit house was attacked. If you want to know the story of those 1,446 Pandits who returned recently, step out of those cosy bukhari-heated drawing rooms of separatist leaders the next time you visit the Valley. Go to Vessu. It's in south Kashmir. May be then you'll also realise that you are a Kashmiri Pandit, not 'Pundit".
This was one face of Pandita. That he has another face as well became clear yesterday night between 10.30 pm and 11 pm, when he opened his mouth and used all kinds of invectives and epithets against the Indian political system. Actually, he was participating in CNN IBN debate (Face the Nation) on the hanging of Afzal Guru and its likely impact on Kashmir. "Secularist" Sagrika Ghose was the anchor and the participants - apart from Pandita - included former Jammu University's Maharaja Gulab Singh Chair Professor Sadiq Wahid (presently on the staff of Kashmir University) and Gul Mohammad Wani, again of Kashmir University, both known for their pro-separatist views. Both Wahid and Wani condemned the Indian State, Indian political system and Indian judicial system and repeatedly said that the hanging of Guru would have very negative impact on the Kashmiri psyche and the "peace process' between India and Pakistan and would further add to the "alienation" of Kashmiri Muslims. Both of them bemoaned the hanging of Guru and tried to establish that the Indian State is insensitive to the aspirations and feelings of Kashmiri Muslims.It was expected that they would be unsparing while reflecting on India and its judicial system.
But it was not expected that Pandita, who only a few days ago came out with a book on Kashmir and the plight of his co-religionists, would make common cause with his co-panelists and question the Government of India's decision to hang Guru. He not only took to task the Government of India for its action, but also questioned the Indian judicial system and the manner in which the various courts of India, including the Supreme Court, tried Guru. His were very dangerous intervention and his two interventions proved that when it comes to India, which has given him protection and provided him all the opportunities to lead a dignified life anywhere in the country, barring Kashmir, his views would be similar to the views of the likes of Wahid and Wani. He virtually described as "outrageous" the whole approach of the Union Government. This kind of intellectualism just cannot be appreciated. A man with two faces needs to be shown his rightful place as such persons cause more damage as compared to the likes of Sadiq and Wani. |
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