In the morning Indian prime minister, in a most demeaning fashion announced the so-called financial package, worth of… Hold on; is this package really of any worth?
That evening only, a budding career, movingly a handsome boy got mercilessly massacred. A distinguished person of Kashmiri civil society in a most befitting manner expressed his anguish on Facebook; “a boy repaid rather in advance, the debt worth 80,000 crore, May Allah bless his soul”.
Indeed Allah shall bestow him the highest place; this is the promise of Almighty for the sacred blood sacrificed in a cause. The boy in a most dignified fashion fulfilled his task. That what he was destined for. To uphold the collective honour of the nation, alas the boy had to pay with his blood. The shedding of innocent blood brings burden on our collective conscience, no two opinions about that. The question, however, remains: Are we as a nation capable of upholding the sanctity of a sacred blood? Do we really deserve the relentless sacrifices being offered?
Narendra Modi is not a man of peace, there remains no doubt about that. He came to Kashmir, what was being described as a “historic visit”. Instead of peace, how and when, an international cricket match can be played in the stadium, he was busy addressing mostly to a hired crowd, disgustingly occupied his mind. The famous willow of Kashmir also found mention in his highly rhetorical speech that day. Moreover, a local sports person too was glorified by Modi.
As if a talented cricketer playing for his personal fulfilment, is a quintessential element of the state? Even a pursuit of an unadulterated passion, is being described as an attribute of a lasting peace, what an irony. Narendra Modi weighed Kashmir purely through a financial package. In the absence of peace, of what worth that economic package could be, is rather obvious.
Why should he alone be blamed for appending a price tag to our otherwise cherished dreams? Are we not afflicted with a challenging condition described as a split personality syndrome? We dream of Azadi yet remain to be a slave of wicked materialism.
What’s the real reality of Kashmir: a whistling and cheering, boisterous crowd welcoming the announcement of an economic package, or the boy with lovable features sacrificing his life, while chasing a dream?
Either a repressed nation can pursue freedom or in lieu of that lofty ideal it can accept the make-believe world of economic development? In a resistance, how is it possible for a repressed nation to pursue both; freedom and prosperity? We are unable to make an informed choice, what comes first, dignity or development. When we stand before polling booth rather swarm it, we send across a message to the powers to be; we are for development even if the idea of Azadi in the process gets compromised. Yet without fail we continue to eulogise a fallen militant as a saviour. Here also we participate in droves, we believe that we stand for Azadi. Perhaps we are beholden to the idea of development and prosperity. We, however, unambiguously detest the idea of India in Kashmir. Sentimentally only, we are committed to the idea of Azadi. And we continue to pay a price, rather heavy price for that. Yet we remain captive to the pleasures of life. We tend to make fool of other; actually we are the real victims of our own duplicity.
Can anybody offer a solution to this our worst ordeal? That even perils our very existence. And that presents us as an unreliable people if not unworthy of a salvation. Perhaps we don’t deserve a salvation? In case we are prepared to let go our innate sense of identity, who we are and where we belong to, Indian constitution if not in practice absolutely, in principle do promises equal rights. (In the reign of Narendra Modi, however, the constitution guaranteeing right to dignified existence, right to freedom of expression and to practice one’s faith freely, too have come under siege.
Those are and will continue to be the challenges for Muslim existence in India.) By forgoing our identity consciousness and accepting the complete sovereignty of the state, at least we may be able to save precious lives going waste. We can also claim a legitimate right to the economic development as well. Accepting the complete supremacy of the state, we may, however, be able to break-away from our duplicitous character. Persisting with resistance yet continuing to seek the largesse of the state. In case our honour and dignity and sense of profound identity is dearer to us? As a consequence the hardships of life are rather inevitable.
Of course till the time only, we attain complete salvation. But then we will have to attain absolute consciousness. Half here and half their attitude that we describe as duplicity, obviously is a recipe for disaster. That’s the reason why we are good at creating disasters read conflicts only, and have invariably failed to attain a salvation. Our biggest undoing is that in the absence of complete awakening, we are set-out to attain independence. What do we require first to attain? Certainly social awakening only will lead us towards the path of freedom.
