Category: Articles

Articles

Being a Kashmiri

Editor

Mother tongue is a fundamental tag that ties people into a particular identity. More than geographical identities, it is the idiom you inherit that makes you a people. Humans tend to dream in their mother tongue and it is the language you speak that shapes up your perception. But it is to note with great concern that we are fast losing this peculiar identity. The Kashmiri language, which binds us into a distinctive character, is dying a leisurely death. The official apathy apart, the people who get identified by this…

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About History and 2014 – floods

Editor

Shoeb Hamid About History Social media has received severe criticism lately. Proponents who believe online networking sites like twitter and facebook have encroached on our valuable time which we should utilize for face-to-face interactions ( though less but effective), are right to some extent in their assertions. However, the new media also present advantages, one being which presents volte-face that opponents of facebook and twitter should acknowledge. Perhaps twenty years ago if you were told to recall what happened in the past, the instant and most reliable source would have…

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‘It was like doomsday’

Editor

Hamidullah Dar As I finished my day’s job at the desk on September 6 evening last year, I headed for waiting vehicle to rush to my rented accommodation at Rajbagh. As we drove on Zero Bridge, Jhelum waters were kissing the upper brims of the river banks. It was a frightful sight, made more menacing by the night hours and the flurry of emergent activities going on all around. The level of water was at its devastating high as any breach could prove disastrous for almost half of Srinagar city.…

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Resilience shown in the face of pain, loss

Editor

Floods: A Year Later For a moment, Ahmad (40) from the Chattabal locality of Srinagar thought everything was lost. He saw his two children and wife crying, struggling in the water and drowning when the boat, in which they were being rescued during the floods last year, hit something and capsized. The fate, however, had something else in store for them. Another boat which was rowing nearby rushed and saved the family. Ahmad (last name used) is haunted by the memory of the floods and has not returned home at…

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Package or no package, Kashmir will rise again

Editor

Two tragedies that I witnessed in my recent past are stuck to my memories- the disastrous earthquake that hit on Oct. 8, 2005 and the floods of September 7, 2015. The earthquake hit the Pakistan-administered Kashmir region and the North-West Frontier Province of Pakistan; it also affected adjacent parts of India and Afghanistan too badly. At least 79,000 people were killed and more than 32,000 buildings collapsed in Kashmir, with additional fatalities and destruction, making it one of the most destructive earthquakes of contemporary times. Morning 8:50 AM; I was…

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Who will ostracise ghosts of the Sept 6, 2014 Kashmir floods

Editor

Few Kashmiris can forget the night of September 6, 2014 and the horror that continued for nearly a month after unprecedented floods hit Jammu and Kashmir this day last year. Summer capital Srinagar bore the brunt of nature’s fury on that day. As scores of houses collapsed in Srinagar’s posh residential areas, so did the state government and the capacity of the administration to organise timely rescue and relief operations. Thousands of people in Rajbagh, Jawahar Nagar, Wazir Bagh, Gogjibagh, Rambagh, Solina, Barzalla, Chanapora, Bemina, Natipora, Nowpora, Karan Nagar, Shetrashshi…

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Afzal Guru, Yakub Memon hangings send signals of weak Govt: Justice Ajit Prakash Shah

Editor

Less than a week after after he demitted office as Chairman of the Law Commission of India after submitting a landmark report recommending abolition of death penalty except in cases of terror attacks, former Delhi High Court Chief Justice Ajit Prakash Shah Friday said the sudden and “secretive” hanging of Parliament attack convict Afzal Guru was a mistake by the government. “I don’t understand why it had to be done so secretly and so suddenly. In my opinion, it was a sign of weakness and caused great setback to attempts…

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Peer-ing Into The ABYSS

Editor

Mufti Sayeed’s whirling dervish act sparks a heated conversation about privilege. Muhammad Tahir Last month, we learnt from highly placed sources that the Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir Mufti Sayeed was undergoing hallucinatory experiences; his advanced age of 79 summers taking a toll on his old mind and bladder made him see ghosts of the bygone era called 2002-2005. Now just last week, our sources told us that Mufti was feeling dizzy and then, in the next few moments, whirling like a (very slow) dervish. He was almost going…

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India can’t afford to ignore the growing Burhan’s of Kashmir

Editor

New Delhi must start a dialogue with moderates like the Mirwaiz and Yasin Malik before more youth turn to armed uprising. 21-year old Burhan Muzaffar Wani — a local militant commander of the largest indigenous guerrilla outfit Hizb-ul-Mujahideen — is fast emerging as the new face of armed rebellion in the Kashmir Valley. He is the poster boy of new militancy and carries a cash reward of Rs 1 million on his head. Last Friday, a group of young boys were seen holding pictures and posters of Hizb commander, dressed in…

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Can Mehbooba Mufti keep PDP together?

Editor

She, however, has no previous record of running a government and is considered temperamental. Naseer Ganai News of Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed’s failing health came from none other than People’s Democratic Party (PDP) president Mehbooba Mufti. Two weeks ago, after coming out of a six-month-long hibernation, Mehbooba addressed her party workers in south Kashmir, known as the PDP bastion. She broke down at the mention of her father, Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, at the workers’ convention. During her speech, the PDP president mentioned her father, but could…

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