On May 6th, 2020, the members of GCU Kashmiri society commenced a series of online interactive sessions aiming to bridge the gap between the Kashmiri intelligentsia and the students to build on the intellectual, political, and cultural tropes of the Kashmiri dispute. Taking on board a diverse range of speakers, scholars, and activists fighting the Kashmiri cause, many debates were indulged to impartially weigh in every available medium to highlight and search for a possible solution to the dispute. The first session, conducted on the same day with a Kashmiri journalist based in Srinagar, IOK, kickstarted with the discussion on mental health conditions, the plight of journalists, Ramadan amidst the lockdown, and the future of Kashmiri people. The discussion was made interactive by the input of questions and queries from the members. This is a post-event report of the session.
As the month of May approached, bringing along unsettling worries and trials around the world in the first wave of COVID-19, the BJP government in India kept its busy waltzing a series of draconian reforms in engineering a model of state persecution. From the viscous Domicile Law preying the right to private property of indigenous population to the indifferent negation of the disputed identity of the Kashmiris, the BJP government’s desire in impunity has been far from being satiated-the ruthless stint of violence on the innocent Kashmiris stays omnipresent even to this day. The state persecution model was elaborate and had fanged the mental health institution and sent news broadcasters into gallows under the unlawful Public Safety Act (PSA). Journalism amidst these atrocious times caught attention of the international media and brought laurels and hope to the valley.
The GCU Kashmir Society also took a Srinagar-based journalist who showcased an impartial peek cross-LOC into the Indian Occupied Kashmir.
The journalist wished his identity be kept anonymous.
Mental Health: Since the struggle for self-determination piloted, Kashmiris have witnessed harrowing spectacles of massacres and unending stints of atrocities. The Indian state has engineered, from top to bottom, a model of oppression to harass its subjects’ rights to private properties, inciting stampedes of pallet-gun riots, and an uncompensated blow to the mental health.
Numerous studies across the years have revealed a traumatizing score of statistics on the ratio of active symptoms of PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) in the population. A study conducted in 2015 by a Srinagar-based Institute of Mental Health and Neuroscience (IMHANS) and Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) found that nearly 1 in 5 people in the Kashmiri population show symptoms of PTSD. Also, Dr. Arshad Husain, a co-author for one these reports and a psychiatrist, calls the valley as one of the “saddest places in the world”.
The session was keen on highlighting the mental health condition in Kashmir. Answering the question related to the deteriorating condition of mental health in the valley, the journalist added: “We claim that Kashmir is not only the highly militarized region in the world, but the most depressed-because the conflict and militarization has produced a tremendous impact on people.” Explaining the effects of the state-persecution on the minds of its subjects, the journalist added: “Just think of it as over 1Lac people have been killed and in the population of 7-8 Lac people-everybody knows somebody who has been killed.” Talking about the deplorable lack of medical facilities in Srinagar he said: “We have hardly six psychiatrists in the entire valley of 8Lac population…you can do the math.”
Journalism: The record of Indian government with the Kashmiri journalists is a bleak one. India has been playing a strong-arm tactic with the people of the press to strangulate and harass their freedom of speech. Days past the August 5th, 2019, the state-tyranny taking the law enforcements under it wings has gone after the journalists one by one. A report released by the Research Section of Kashmir Media Service on the World Press Freedom Day described Kashmir as “one of the most dangerous places of the world where people associated with the press and media are performing their professional duties in the most difficult circumstances and situation.”
A report also gazetted the ad hominem incarceration of journalists who have bravely stood facing each malice in the ongoing liberation struggle. “Media is under a constant threat in the territory where Journalists are booked by the occupation authorities under draconian laws for reporting the truth,” the report also added.
Waseem Andrabi, Saram Aijaz, Naseer Ahmed Ghani, and three photo journalists Musarrat Zahra, Gowhar Geelani, Peerzada Aashiq have been illegally tried against exercising their right to express. However, it proved to be a blessing in disguise because days later, Musarrat Zahra’s work got international recognition quenching her the Photo Journalism Award, hosted by International Women Media Foundation. Chammi Anand, Mukhtar Khan, Dar Yaseen, of the Associate Press, were awarded Pulitzer Prize this year for their exceptionally challenging career of covering the harrowing spectacles of human rights violations.
Lauding the international recognitions of Journalism in the Pulitzer Prize 2020, the journalist added: “It truly has been a victory for the cause but still there are some worrisome things on our minds-as India is a big corporate economy and has a huge lobby in many international news agencies. The local journalists also face a towering sense of structural censorship where the truth is so filtered out that what remains of that is dust…”
Such a heightened sense of press censorship has proved a devil and the deep sea because the foreign aid and other human rights groups cannot do the field research and gather information.
“Kashmiri journalists are called to police stations and are questioned and harassed for hours,” the report said also mentions, describing the testing times for the journalists in the valley.
The reprehensible state of fear of the police-raids has also crippled even the internationally recognized human rights groups working for the public relief. “Everything is bugged…organization such as MSF and Amnesty International had to also lend their help through a second-hand channel-after the earthquake of 2005, these organization began their work on these issues-MSF has been the first to acknowledge the mental health abuse in the valley.”
Giving the dismal picture of the hierarchical truncations on the press, the journalist also explained the propaganda of “parachute journalism” in the valley. “This scheme of parachute journalism has a long history. It’s not new. The Indian government invites a team of well-paid journalists to the valley with the aim to spread propaganda. They hijack facts and spread the tell-tale of paddy-fields and lush green landscapes.”
Ramadan in the Valley: The moderators felt the need to talk about their Muslim Kashmiri brethren routining in the sacred month. As the month Ramadan is known for its festivities and spiritual retreat for the Muslims around the world.
The members of GCU Kashmir Society also wished to know especially what goes on in the life of a Kashmiri Muslim in this month-bearing in mind their ever-present persecution. “The Kashmiri people are so good at the community service. In the evenings it is a ritual that everyone brings food and meals to the mosques. There they collect it and start distributing it everywhere.”
Acknowledging the sense of community service in the valley, the journalist added: “The communal bondage in the valley is very strong. If any incident happens, the people are the first to rush and help. We have a community where youth and old alike show the same sense of bondage.”
Kashmir Political Struggle
The unending episode of human rights violations has a history of pigeon-holing in the international media and United Nations. The global apathy spears a divide between the legal resolutions and their implementation. An advantage for RSS-led BJP government to choreograph their ultra-right wing agendas of crushing dissent and ethnic cleansing throughout the country has had a formidable success.
Answering the question on the present and future of Kashmiris, the journalist said: “The case of Kashmir is almost black and white. The reason for the international apathy is that we are not being able to build pressure. We have almost overcooked this question of WHAT DO KASHMIRIS Want? Well. Self Determination. I have always reverted the question and asked WHAT DO KASHMIRIS DON’T WANT? The answer is simple. Kashmiris don’t want to stay with India-that is by consent there amongst all the spectrums of thought and as a common minimum ground… let us start there-the people don’t want killing. The people want an end to violence-that is where we start. For that we need DEMILITARIZATION and all the other peace resolutions-but foremost the killing has to stop. I think that is where everything revolves around.”
Reflecting a poignant state of massacres happening in the valley even merciless to the toddlers, the journalist added: “You don’t start talking about someone’s healing before stitching the wound-healing begins afterwards. Let the people exercise their right to self-determination.”
The painful struggle for freedom for the innocent Kashmiris has always been sabotaged by the lack of Kashmiri representation. Generally a common practice of different third-parties, when pleading the case of Kashmir’s dispute in United Nations the people from the valley have not been taken on board.
Perhaps this is the reason, the journalist believes, that it has not had the required effect. “In the events subsequent to the August 5th revocation of special status, the expatriate Kashmiris around the world have come out to plead their case. Perhaps this was the reason the international press came to life. We need Kashmiris on board to fight their cause in the United Nations. We are in a position to know better.”
Grieving the freedom movement’s faltering attention internationally, the journalist added: “the movement should’ve been led by the Kashmiris.”
When the moderators asked what was expected from Pakistan in these trying times, the journalist replied: “We do expect a lot from Pakistan. I mean, as being Muslims. And it has always been that way. We always felt closest to Pakistan. But again, the movement should’ve been led by the Kashmiris.”
Lauding the student participation and online activism of GCU Kashmir Society, the journalist, when asked what could the campus based society do to highlight the Kashmiri cause, said that the aim to amplify the voices of Kashmiris was by bridging the news coming from the valley to the people outside. “One way where students like you are helpful-let our voices reach others. We record everything that happens in the valley. We are pretty good at that. Bring the voice from down to the people.”
With wishes and best assurances to meet these expectations, the session was successfully concluded.
GCU Kashmir Society is determined to conduct online sessions of such kind with experts and scholars around the world to bring forward the black and white of the Kashmir’s struggle for freedom and to get an impartial picture and unmask the shameless violations of Human rights on the Kashmiri people.
The writer can be reached at Hamzamudassir013@gmail.com
