Why I left my hometown

The boy, whose childhood was trampled by guns and grenades, still lives somewhere within me

Daanish Bin Nabi

If one looks into one's most cherished world of worlds, the mother and the hometown can be ranked together. One is attached equally to both, and the pain of separation never gets assuaged.Today, I am away from both - my mother and my hometown Sopore, where she lives. I visit my family occasionally, but I have never really gone back to Sopore. I left it when I was 15. The separation pains me, but I dread going back to the streets and the house which I once loved so much.

I was born when the buds of militancy had just started springing in Kashmir - in 1988. My childhood passed through the thunder of bullets and grenades.

While the fire was to grip all of Kashmir soon, the rebellious Sopore had always been at the forefront for demanding right to self determination from India. The town is a strong citadel of Syed Ali Geelani and Jamaat-e-Islami. Once known as Chhota London, has been a major irritant for the security grid of India for close to three decades now. 

Our house was in the old town of Sopore. I have spent many sleepless nights watching my parents running from one window to the other, anxiously keeping track of the encounters (fierce gunfights) between militants and Indian forces. In the 1990s, the encounters sometimes raged on for days together.

How do I describe the fear that choked my throat every time I saw my panic-stricken parents at the windows, trying to shield us in case of any eventuality.

These nightmares were not restricted to the encounters we heard from our windows.

I have studied at one of the prestigious schools of Kashmir, St Joseph's School in Baramulla district. My brother, younger sister, our cousins and I would take the same bus to school, covering 27 kilometres one way.

Once, when I was in Class 1, we were coming back from school when our bus was stopped at the entrance of Sopore town, in the area called Sangrama. A gunfight was raging in the town. Somehow, the three of us managed to reach our aunt's place with the help of a neighbour whom we met at Sangrama.

For the next three days, we had no information about our parents - both were government employees. I had an uncle who was handicapped, as was my grandmother. They had no information about us or our parents.

I remember hearing the elders say that the encounter had taken place near our residence. Our house faced the road, which made it more vulnerable to a crossfire between the militants and the Indian forces.

That day, no one but my handicapped grandmother was at home. She told us later that when the encounter was on, she had overheard something that had made her tremble with fear. An army man had said that that they would burn down the entire locality that day, since encounters in the old town of Sopore had become a daily affair.

Despite her disability, Dadi managed to collect the valuable items of the house in a small anteroom. Her fear was that if the forces burnt down the house, at least something would be saved for the family. Late at night, she left the house to go to a relative's house in a safer area. It was after four days that we saw our parents and learnt that our Dadi and uncle were safe.

Through the 1990s, the encounters continued almost on a daily basis. On January 6, 1993, the Border Security Force (BSF) killed 55 civilians, and the main market of Sopore was almost entirely burnt down. Many civilians were burnt alive that day in their homes and shops.

I still remember walking with my father through the rubble of the Main Chowk at Sopore. We had to cross to other side of Jhelum to reach old Sopore. I was only five at that time. The stench of corpses was so nauseating that I vomited twice. For a week thereafter, there was an eerie silence all around Sopore. Now, when I watch a movie related to war, the horrors of the Sopore massacre fill my mind.

Just a year later, in 1994, I had to bid goodbye to Hamid, my childhood friend.

Hamid was our neighbour. On the day of his circumcision, I did not go to school so that I could give him company. Raziya aunty, his mother, treated us both equally.

Our bond could not last for long. One fateful day, an encounter started at about 2 pm. At around 6 pm, the fierce gunfight was still on.

Locked in a suffocating atmosphere for more than four hours, Hamid's father decided to go out into the verandah of their house for a smoke. He was puffing on his cigarette when the Army saw him. He was dragged out of his house and shot (brest, as we use to call it in Kashmiri) in front of our gate on the other side of the lane.

The night following his killing still haunts me. Hundreds of people had assembled in both of our houses. Hamid kept wailing - we kya karo es cha ni wagaer (what will we do now without you). He was in Class 4 at that time.

After four days of mourning - as is the tradition in Kashmir - Raziya aunty and Hamid left our locality and shifted to the house of aunty's parents. Till this day, I do not know where Hamid is.

Every Kashmiri has a bitter experience of the 1990s, and the relentless crackdowns of those years.

It was 1995 that changed our lives forever.

Kashmiris used to be dragged of their houses in the wee hours and assembled in a vast ground. These would either be the lawns of local masjids or government schools in the area.

In Sopore, the locals used to assemble on the main road of the old town, adjacent to Jhelum.

In April 1995, there was a crackdown in our area. The male members of every family were asked to assemble in front of the local mosque. Women and children were ordered to assemble in the lawns. The announcement about the crackdown was made at around 6 am from the masjid.

By 9am, the voices of screaming men started to fill our ears. The merciless beating by the forces during a crackdown was routine then.

When we came out, I saw my dad standing on one side of the road, holding his left arm with his right arm. Some army men had taken him to the bank of river Jhelum and broken his left arm. Without wasting any time, my mother hired a cab and we left for Srinagar's Bone and Joint Hospital.

We left Sopore at 10am and reached the hospital at 1pm. The car had to be driven very slowly, because the road was bad and each jerk left my dad writhing in pain. We (siblings) were traumatised by the horrifying experience.

For one month, we stayed with our aunt in Srinagar and would not go home till our father agreed to move to another part of Sopore (bit safer). We could not bear to live anymore in the street where we had suffered horrifying experiences.

The pain and agony that my parents, my dadi and uncle went through while shielding the three of us from the wrath of forces, encounters and crackdown is something that I can never forget. My parents had only one wish, and that was to see us (siblings) together and happy.

We shifted to other part of Sopore eight months after my father was injured. Such experiences made me highly wary of the Army. The fear of the Army was now so deep-rooted in my psyche that whenever I used to as much as fleetingly look at the Army, it seemed as if my nightmares were coming true.

There are other incidents like Mehmoods Sahab's dua during a crackdown, Ayub Shargar's (a local militant) firing daily at 7pm, how for first time Indian tanks were rolled out in the town, the pillar of our house where I used to stand whenever there was a firing, how my father was picked up by forces during a crackdown, the countless nights when we did not sleep because of the incessant firing, the militants asking for matchboxes to light their cigarettes while waiting to ambush an Army convoy, my mother pleading with the militants to go somewhere else, the tales of Akbar Bhai, the 1994 rally when Shabir Shah was freed, the bullet-riddled bodies of Hamid's father and his other relative, how my two cousins were killed and many others. Those anguished times have left a permanent impact on me.

Finally in 2004, at age of 15, I left my hometown Sopore for good. My family still lives there, and I visit them sometimes, but the streets of my hometown do not draw me anymore.

The boy, whose childhood was trampled by guns and grenades, still lives somewhere within me. He cannot return to Sopore. I cannot return to Sopore.

This Eid, I again went to celebrate Eid with my family. My dadi is no more now and uncle is hardly able to walk without support.

As of Sopore, hardly anything has changed apart from some roads have been macadamised and a bridge built, which took 25 years to get completed.

The alienation of people against New Delhi has touched new heights. If the days are somewhat passable, the nights are still the same, like the 1990s (only the firing has ceased).

This time, I failed again to persuade my father to shift permanently to Srinagar like we all did in 1995.

Published in DailyO on September 28, 2015