HAMARA DESH, HAMARA TIRANGA
Alongside the banks of Mawar river, Khurshid Dar owned a beautiful, small house. He had a understanding and beautiful wife and was blessed with two young daughters. He earned his living by driving a taxi ferrying passengers to and from the nearest town of Handwara, to Srinagar. Khurshid had witnessed the last thirty years of violence and conflict in Kashmir.
Khurshid was 10 years old when the neighbours who worshipped different ‘Gods’ left forever and they took alongwith them his friends with whom he used to play. The wave of conflict started thereafter, bringing a change in the society he was growing up in. He saw influx of people with Afghani & Pakistani descent bringing in ‘iron toys’ which could take lives. He also witnessed the targeted recruitment of motivated youth by various groups which claimed that they would bring so called ‘freedom’ to Kashmir. This recruitment nearly engulfed Khurshid as well. But thanks to his father’s wisdom and Khurshid’s maturity, he was able to look at the bigger game. This game of chess was being played by various political personalities with the local Kashmiris playing the role of pawns.
The so called ‘freedom fighters’ were ready to sacrifice all, achieve martyrdom and had no plans for Kashmir after the ‘freedom’ was claimed. The tool of the ‘rebels’ was emotion instead of logic. These groups promoted hatred, revenge, death and war. Words like education, growth, development, livelihood, equality and happiness were alien to them. In fact the groups declared formal education, specially to girls as ‘haram’ and threatened those parents who dared to send their children to schools. They wanted the girls to wear Hijabs and Burgas to schools. Khurshid’s daughters were bright. They had dreams of shining brighter than the sun. So, often for Khurshid, the idea of freedom would create a whirlpool of thoughts in his mind. He would begin weighing the heaviness of political and personal independence. Being a husband and a father, it would be the latter which weighed more.
Khurshid had witnessed the Army since his early childhood. On the days the Army would not be hunting for the ‘armed rebels’, it would be helping the people in some form or the other. Over the years Khurshid saw the Army providing a helping hand in difficult times, and saving lives of the people. Be it medicines to the sick or building crossing points on streams, the Army was always there.
One fine afternoon, Khurshid was waiting in his taxi at a chowk to ferry passengers. Two policemen came to him. One of them was Khurshid’s neighbour and a good friend, Asif Mir. They both greeted each other and talked for a while. Asif was happy as he was going to be blessed with a child. Asif invited Khurshid for dinner at his house in the evening. A few seconds after Asif said goodbye and went his way, Khurshid heard a deafening burst of an Ak47 rifle. He turned to see a Pheran clad young man holding the rifle and running away. Just a few meters to the side there lay Asif and his colleague in a pool of blood. Khurshid froze. Just few seconds before Asif was talking, laughing and happy. Within those few seconds not one but two families had been destroyed. It was too late to take them to the hospital. It was too late to try anything. After attending the funeral of his friend Asif, Khurshid went back to his home and did not venture out for a couple of days.
A whirlpool of thoughts occupied his minds again. That day, two questions changed Khurshid’s beliefs. If the fight was for freedom of Kashmir, why did his friend die who was also a Kashmiri? And if the fight was for Islam, why did his friend die who used to pray five times a day?
Khurshid realized that the fight never had a real cause. It was and remains a political game of chess where the people of Kashmir were pawns. His mind was never so clear. The picture of his wife and his daughters dominated his vision. The next day Khurshid resumed his livelihood. Standing at the same chowk where his friend was killed, he waited for the passengers.
Across the road he saw the board of the Army camp nearby. “APKA DESH, APKA TIRANGA” it read. Khurshid went to a shop, grabbed a small box of paint and a brush. He walked across to the board as the eyes of the people around turned towards him. And he wrote, “HAMARA DESH, HAMARA TIRANGA”.
