20 years of absence in greater kashmir

8/3/2019 20 Years of Absence in Greater Kashmir

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Twenty Years of Absence-in Greater Kashmir

Come Spring and small streams emanating out of Doodh Ganga would be full of water and the

perennial brook near my home would be enticing small boys to its muddy banks. The willows will

be in a new green hue while the solitary apple tree in my courtyard would be quietly awaiting the

arrival of its fruits of labour.

Swarms of men and women would be ready for thal or sowing of the paddy saplings. People

would dig small pipe like canals from the flowing streams to their fields. There would be minor

quarrels among people as they jostle for water. But all that would be amicably settled. Chirping

birds would fly down to pick insects from the freshly ploughed soil. Young girls would carry

samovars full of hot salt tea and bagfuls of bread to their family members working in the fields. The

teachers would have it easy though. A ready stock of students would be eager to work on their

fields in hope of a mass promotion to the next grade. My village, would hear women sing in

mesmerizing tones Rasul Mirs Hariye thavak na kan ti lolo. The mild sun would shine over my

small, non- descript village Kanipora.

I was seven when the elders of our house decided to sell our ancestral house at 10, Qutubdin Pora,

Ali Kadal, Srinagar and move to a new location on the outskirts of the city. There was a deep sense

of loss as the truck moved out of the narrow downtown lanes to the wider roads leading out of the

city. I thought of Sallam the butcher, Kare Kon the local candy man, the flowing Vitasta ,the Batyaar

Mandir, Rishi Peers Aastan and the avuncular saint Rahbab Saheb. I would miss them all, I thought.

These were the by-lanes, the narrow by-lanes where we lived among Nawchis. Sultans, Patigaroos

,Dars, Hagars and Kauls. Then of course there was a man who seemed like a lunatic to all of us;



someone who would have tea in a 5kg P-Mark Tin and share his Tale-vor (a local variety of

Kashmiri bread) with dogs. He was called Hone-Rahman. No one knew where he came from. I was

scared yet fond of him. It was him who I was to miss the most.

I was now a student of The New Cambridge Public School (later re-christened as Angels Garden) the

only English medium school in the entire village. The school was housed in an old dilapidated

building near the saw mill not very far from the main bus stand, not that there was any other bus

stand in or around our village. Kanipora was a block in the Chadoora Tehsil of Budgam district of

Kashmir subdivision of Jammu and Kashmir. It had a non working post office, a branch of State

Bank of India, an Elaqaui Dehati Bank, a Boys High School, a Middle school for girls, a terrible

primary healthcare centre and a very bad road connecting Kanipora to Kralpora-an equally small

village on the main road to Char-e-Sharief .It was on this bad road that we had our new house-a

palatial house compared to the concrete pigeon hole called a flat, that I live in now.

The new house was bereft of any living neighbours. The only other house around was a huge house

across the small brook. The owners, we were told were too scared to live in that house. This is a

haunted house they would say. One of their cousins, a short man with a beard would come to visit

the house from time to time. His name was Khursheed and he was a probably a teacher in one of the

Government schools in Srinagar. But Srinagar was far now, thirteen kilometres from the main bus

stand and fourteen from our home.The new house had a brook for running water and toilets were

still a luxury. Endless vast expanse of green surrounded us and some hundred meters behind us

was a small cremation ground. That seemed to be the only companion and neighbour that we had

till a Peer Sahib with his three sons started building a house near the grazing field. The village had

walnut trees, chinars, poplars, willows and yes it grew some strawberries and saffron too.

The village Moqadam was a pious man called Rasul Daar. He was a man with a great sense of

humour and would often laugh at his own self. It was his grandson who was to be my best pal, my

alter ego in times to come. It has been long; I have seen Yaseen or heard from him. I write this in

hope that he may read it and get in touch with me. We would attend tuitions together in Nawab

Bazzar where my uncle would teach us Mathematics. Another of my friends Ashwani met me here

in Delhi after a gap of seventeen years. It was a tearful re-union as we talked about our common

past, the village swamp and our uncertain future. Two of them, me, Mushtaq, Shafiq, Ameen and my

younger brother Rinku would play cricket on Motilal Khars land, the land he was planning to build



a house on after his spinster brothers death. Neither did Mohan Lal die in Kashmir nor did Moti Lal

ever make a house.

There was a family of Thokurs pronounced locally as Thukre who lived in a dark lane near the

biggest apple orchard of the village. The families of two brothers lived in a wood house with freshly

painted wooden stairs and a big courtyard. The house was a picture of prosperity in an otherwise

no so rich village. One early morning the elder Thukre and his wife were seen leaving the village,

their only belonging being the metal trunk painted light green overall with purple coloured leaves

and flowers adorning its borders. His unceremonious departure was talked about in hushed tones

in the village. None had a clue where he would head to and none ever knew where he went. After a

few days of his exodus no one even mentioned a word about him. Ramzan Thukres son Farooq, my

junior in my school was now the only inheritor to the property of Thukrs.

I am sure the village would have changed now. The Railway Line might have changed the fortunes

of the people who owned some land in the vicinity of the rail tracks. I just hope they havent cut the

chinars of the village. The three Chinars near the green coloured mosque where the rivulet and the

road take a bend are keepers of my yesteryears secrets. The second of the three Chinars, yes the

one in the centre was already beginning to show signs of hollowness in late eighties. Is it still alive?

Twenty years is a long time. Ghlam Nabi the tailor must have grown old and his brother Wosta Ali

must have excelled further in the art of masonry. The three shops near the Pomegranate orchard

must have become more now. Would they still be selling Thoole Mithae ,I wonder. There must be no

Prabha School anymore. Incidentally I could not attend Prabhawatis funeral in Jammu.Men and

women would now be returning to their homes after a hard days work. They would soon fall

asleep. The night sets in early at my village. Far away someone is singing.M ae Chu basan mae ma

gache shaam vatey.

By:-

Priyanka Kaul

PGP/SS/11-13/IIPM

20 years of absence in greater kashmir

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