Kashmir Halcyon:

By Daanish Bin Nabi  Published by Kashmir Walla on 30 Sep 2018 As soon as New Delhi blew the civic-poll bugle in Jammu and Kashmir, it remains divided on the forefront of poll preparations. While the Jammu division of the state is in a celebratory mood, the Kashmir Valley remains marred with the calls of boycott and violence.  Using the attempts to abrogate Article-35A as a shield, the two main regional parties – National Conference (NC) and Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), called for a complete boycott of the polls. Taking the advantage of the void, the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has gained leaps and bounds from north to south in the Valley. The urban local body elections are being planned to held in four-phases from 8 October to 16 while the nine-phased Panchayat polls shall begin on 17 November. More than 700 nomination forms have been filed by prospective candidates for the first phase of urban local body elections. Sidelining every ...

By Daanish Bin Nabi   Published by Kashmir Walla on 9 March 2016 Legions of cultural programmmes are organized every year in which people perform and participate with much enthusiasm. Other than their aesthetic value, such programmes also have elements of entertainment, which make them acceptable to audiences in most of the cases.  “The country without a post Office,” a cultural programme organised by the Jawaharlal Nehru University students, may be counted as representing that anomaly which goes contrary to the mentioned public response. This programme organised in JNU did not go down well with the pseudo-Hindu nationalists. In turn, the hyper Indian media got a ready made issue. The problem with people like Arnabs is that they always wait for such “cultural programmes” to happen so that their TRPs go up, but turn a blind eye when it comes to Kashmir. The much shouted and lectured news hour programme of Arnab Goswami was aptly described by an E...

By Daanish Bin Nabi   Published by News Central 24/7 on October 6, 2018 Certain quarters in the Valley view the killings of the policemen as ‘Kashmiri versus Kashmiri’ The abduction and killing of three policemen in south Kashmir’s   Shopian has set the ball rolling for a rift between local populace and the indigenous Jammu Kashmir Police department. In the twin villages of Batagund and Kaprin, the three policemen were first abducted and then killed during the wee hours of last Friday. The deceased were Kulwant Singh, SPO Firdous Ahmed Kuchey and Constable Nissar Ahmed Dhobi.  A high ranking police official told NewsCentral24x7, “The support for the militancy has started to dwindle gradually as such incidents (harassment of and attacks on families of policemen) have increased in the recent times in south Kashmir.” The officer added, “I am sure that we will soon see local support for the militants coming to an end.” It is for the first t...

By Daanish Bin Nabi   Published by News Central 24/7 on  August 1, 2018 The BJP has rattled PDP in its own backyard – south Kashmir. Had PDP not betrayed its own workers, things might have been different this time for the party. With the security situation in southern Kashmir remaining on edge as the daily civilian and militant killings go unabated, the mainstream political space in the region is fast shrinking. This has adversely affected the space occupied by the ground workers and polling agents of mainstream political parties in the area. Danish Ganai, on behalf of News Central 24×7, travels to various areas of the region to understand the pulls and pressures faced by political workers in the Valley.  Social boycott In south Kashmir, one of the main challenges was identifying grass-roots workers. One after the other refused to talk to News Central 24×7, but we managed to speak with a BJP worker in the volatile district of Pulwama. M...

By Daanish Bin Nabi   Published by News Central 24/7 on  July 16, 2018 The Army denies the allegations. Travelling to south Kashmir has always been an adventure – lush green valleys and mountains, rivulets and above all, the heart-warming and welcoming people. However, a small incident in October 2010, initially overlooked by most, changed the scenic as well as the political landscape of South Kashmir. Hizbul Mujahideen’s poster boy Burhan Muzaffar Wani, his younger brother and one of his friends were beaten and harassed by the Special Operations Group (SoG) of the Jammu & Kashmir Police. Eight years down the line, South Kashmir is no less than a war zone.  Two years ago on July 8 2016,   Burhan Wani, along with two other militants, was killed in an encounter carried out by the SoG of the Jammu & Kashmir police. A high ranking official of the SoG, who is intimately involved in the anti-militancy operations in South Kashmir told N...

By Daanish Bin Nabi   Published by News Central 24/7 on Jul 10, 2018 PDP is a divided house which has already seen three MLAs revolting against Mehbooba Mufti. Political pundits had termed the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) alliance in Jammu & Kashmir as the “Unholy Alliance”. This “Unholy Alliance” came to a dramatic end when BJP withdrew support on June 19. However, there are reports suggesting that BJP is again trying to form the government in the state, with the help of disgruntled MLAs of other unionist parties.  BJP’s game plan Reports are ripe that the BJP is attempting everything under its belt to form a government, eyeing the 2020 assembly elections in the state. Under the PDP-BJP government, not only did the security situation in the region worsened, it was felt that the government failed on the developmental front as well. Hence, the BJP currently has nothing to offer its vote-bank in the Jammu divis...

Bukhari was a mentor who groomed many journalists in Kashmir. By Daanish Bin Nabi   Published by News Central 24/7 on July 4, 2018 Syed Shujaat Bukhari was a man of many shades. From journalism to philanthropist to activism, he walked and talked it all. He was a tall figure but his humility and mannerism would even make the sky bow down in respect. Surely, such a towering personality did not deserve to die a brutal death. Shujaat Bukhari was brutally killed along with his two Personal Security Officers on June 14 in Press Enclave, Srinagar. Bukhari’s name would go down in history as one who gave his life to the cause of Kashmir and Kashmiriyat. Here is the story of one of the bravest journalists to have walked on Kashmiri soil.  Shujaat’s early life Born on February 25, 1968, Bukhari passed his ...