Kashmir Halcyon:

Daanish Bin Nabi Sunday, January 15, 2017, we had planned to visit some relatives at our hometown Sopore. The previous night, we had scheduled to leave at 10 am. As usual, the women folk of our household did not meet the deadline, and we left at 11 am. I was fuming with anger, because I believe we must respect and value time.  From 10 to 11 am, I had already scolded my niece Adiva twice for getting late. When her Mom came, I conveyed my anger to her. You can win an argument with an illiterate, but never with a woman. I gave up. But all this was routine family chatter. As soon as I started the car, the atmosphere changed and everyone started chatter. Adiva was still not talking. She never expected such angry words from me. I love her as my own daughter. She knows she means the world to me. As soon as we crossed the bypass road, I started teasing her, making funny faces and noises. I was trying to cheer her, so that she would not remember I had got angr...

Daanish Bin Nabi   The daily life cycle of a protestor makes a curios read. Let us begin with the daily diet offered to Kashmiris by New Delhi and served with most admirable hospitality of armed forces. It is a two-meal two-times a day thing that begins with a breakfast wherein armed forces simply look at you as if you are a perpetual convict on run. The military guys seems to have been trained to say without speaking a word, by just the look – try it and we will nail you before your thought ends. The icing on the cake is when a person is frisked, for no reason, literally no reason. A military guy looks at you and if your thought even wanders you run the risk of being questioned by the roadside with the rest of the people with a sympathetic face – poor lad, he will get it today. Then comes the lunch, where if you are not arrested for protesting against the mother of all violations, you at least get few dozen pellets. Usually, you get hit in your eyes, except when the m...

Daanish Bin Nabi The five-member delegation led by senior BJP leader and former Union Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha, which is presently on visit to Kashmir, is the third delegation in last few months that is trying to have a meaningful parley and bridge the gap between Srinagar and New Delhi. The first two teams to come to Kashmir to cool tempers were the All Party Delegation (APD) and the one led by senior journalist and “Kashmir expert” Seema Mustafa.  Like the previous two delegation the present one is also star dubbed, comprising of diplomats, journalists and other famous personalities. However, its mission remains the same – to pacify the people only to leave them to rise up again against the establishment. Like the previous delegations the third delegation has so far done nothing concrete apart from meeting various stakeholders and issuing statements like their predecessors. The question that remains to be answered is whether New Delhi is committed ...

Daanish Bin Nabi A report by James Hookway published in Wall Street Journal yesterday brings to foreground the Rohingya crisis and ethnic cleansing in Myanmar that as am matter of fact has been confirmed by UN’s refugee agency. Regional UN Official John McKissick said that the campaign, which has been rigorous since October this year, was that of ethnic cleansing of Rohingya Muslim Minority. Reported by Time and BBC, the UN official said about the Burmese troops as “killing men, shooting them, slaughtering children, raping women, burning and looting houses, forcing these people to cross the river” into neighboring Bangladesh. The state-sponsored terr orism has also led to remonstrations against the 1991 Nobel Peace winner and the State Counsellor, Aung Sang Suu Kyi. Suu Kyi, who visited the outgoing US President Barrack Obama in Washington in September, managed to secure lifting of US sanctions on Myanmar. Come October and the human rights violations in Myanmar have recast dou...

Daanish Bin Nabi In international theory, negative peace refers to the absence of violence. When, for example, a ceasefire is enacted, a negative peace will ensue. It is negative because something undesirable stopped from happening (for example the violence stopped, the oppression ended). Description of negative peace aptly describes today’s Kashmir. Violence from streets has disappeared but the uncertainty of another spell of unrest looms large over Kashmir. After the mass-uprising of 2008, everyone including the “security” apparatus of the state had an impression that it will take another decade for Kashmiris to press for their genuine demands, but 2009 and 2010 was yet to come. Year 2009 and the roiling 2010 protests were more brutal and deadly than 2008 and 2009, which took everyone by surprise. From 2010 onwards, people of Kashmir were again shown the mirror of peace and prosperity in all its “negative” sense. However, the seed of 2016 unrest were sown in 2010 onl...

Daanish Bin Nabi After the arrival of two delegations to break ice in Kashmir, all eyes were on the meet of Unified Separatist Leadership with stakeholders, which took place last week. It was the second breather for the leadership, the first was when they were allowed to sit together and talk, which followed the block off incident by police earlier. The meet last week was important as people were anxious about the future strategy that the leadership was to adopt after receiving feedback from stakeholders. It was also important because as an opportunity it offered a view of political maturity of people and leadership. Overall the unease was more on whether hartals and calendar will continue as it has been.        The opinion on hartal strategy adopted by separatist leadership is varied. A lot of people have explicitly stated their opinions supported with arguments, both in favour and against. It is the second most important development, the...

Daanish Bin Nabi Results of the recent American election surprised the world that had somehow prepared itself to see the first woman President of the United Stated of America. After an intense race for the top slot, the opinion was divided in the middle – those favoring Hillary Clinton and the greater good and those favoring Donald Trump and the overweening narcissism. For an American who for decades has been consuming excessive pride of being high and mighty, Donald Trump is the perfect role model. He is not racist per se, but a true American of yesteryears who believed in taking all. The blast wave of Trump- win travelled far and wide, inspiring awe everywhere. Popular media in America had one of those moments “What really happened, does anyone know” as Trump clinched victory, taking it from almost everyone including himself after his self-sabotaging acts. That is true victory, the American dream, which should be absorbed positively by people who in their heart are no differe...