Commentary/Dilip D'Souza
Defined By Our Minorities
If I know them at all, I know they will laugh at me for saying this: there
was a kind of gentle warmth to the several Kashmiris I knew in college. I
don't know how to account for it, but it was there. Better students than
most of us time-wasters, they had their fun too. Two became my close
friends. We shared affection, respect. Even today, every too-rare contact
makes us wish we were in more regular touch.
I know now that some Kashmiris are Pandits. In those naive years I didn't
even know the label. They were just fellow students. Sometimes we thought
of them as Kashmiri -- especially when they taught us important Kashmiri
swear words -- but only sometimes.
But it's something of a sign of the times that today, I am always aware
that some of those pals of mine are Pandits. That some others are not. When
I meet them, or hear from them, I can't help thinking that the Pandits
among my Kashmiri friends have all had trauma touch them, one way or
another, over the last few years. And I wonder, what happened to the
others? Where are they? What are their traumas? What do they have to say
about what has happened to Kashmir? To us all, college buddies till not so
many years ago?
Nobody should have to go through what Kashmiri Pandits have suffered since
about 1989. Wholesale, almost overnight, they were driven out of their
homes in Srinagar and across the valley. Over three hundred thousand of
them live as refugees in Jammu and in Delhi. They have lost their property,
some lost far more. Their plight is one of the great tragedies of our time,
a dark blot on our country.
And yet, at every contact with my Kashmiri friends, I also can't help
thinking: the real sadness is not, despite the suffering, that they have
been driven from their homes. The true tragedy is that they are an
increasingly forgotten people. And when not forgotten, they are simply
pawns in the hands of one agenda or another.
The Government of India looked the other way as Pandits were thrown out. So
did the rest of us. The National Conference's government in Kashmir, run
today by a man who is untrustworthy to the core, shows no sign that it will
act to bring Pandits back to their homes soon, or not so soon, or at all.
Or that it is even an important issue. Pandits are left to scrabble for
help and support where they can get it. That search leads them to quarters
about as worthy of trust as the chief minister of Kashmir is.
Now I can see that Pandits find some immediate help from men like Bal
Thackeray. But to those men, the situation of Pandits is just today's
convenient springboard for their own political ambitions. Nothing else.
All of which leaves Kashmiri Pandits where they really are today: utterly
alone.
Agnishekhar, the convener of Panun Kashmir, the organisation of Kashmiri
Pandits, told the press in Bombay a few days ago that Pandits are in a
"difficult position" in Kashmir. Being Hindu, they are part of the national
majority. Yet in that state, their home, they are in a minority. That
ordinary fact, that old division into minorities and majorities, has
definite implications for Pandits, for Kashmir, for the country.
But somewhere in that division, if we want to take them, are the seeds for
a better future for Pandits.
Now Pandits have been asking the government of J&K to set up a state
Minorities Commission that will address their particular interests and
problems. Agnishekhar wondered why, when the government has a state Human
Rights Commission, it is unwilling to have a Minorities Commission. When
asked, it claims that with the HRC, there's no need for a separate MC. Then
it points self-righteously to the National Conference's "minorities cell."
But as Agnishekhar says, that is a wing of the party, not a government
agency.
As I listened to Agnishekhar some days ago, I thought of my own state,
Maharashtra. In his words, I heard the echoes of events here only two years
ago. When the present government of Shiv Sainiks and BJP-ites came to
power, it quickly disbanded this state's Minorities Commission. Minorities
here protested, only to be told that there was a HRC and thus no need for a
MC. Besides, said Sena and BJP leaders, we don't think of people in terms
of minorities and majorities.
They forgot a crucial detail: minorities do. As Kashmiri Pandits know.
That's why a Minorities Commission is necessary.
Agnishekhar also told the press about an "interim rehabilitation package"
that Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah has recently drafted, aimed at
displaced Pandits. The draft seems like it was meticulously planned to be a
failure. That's partly because it says Pandits who return to the valley
will have to "earn the goodwill of the majority community."
Oh yes? Exactly why should Pandits have to earn anybody's goodwill? They
must return on their own terms, to the properties and homes that were
stolen from them. That's all.
But the echoes sounded in my ears again: of demands that we've all heard
over and over. Muslims must join the "mainstream", prove their patriotism,
their love for India, their respect for Hindus. Take just one such, from
only a year ago. That was when M F Husain's old painting of a topless
Goddess Saraswati suddenly became an issue. When it did, the Sena's rag
demanded that all Muslims "join Hindus in their relentless campaign against
Husain. Or else the ordinary Hindu will get confirmed in his belief that
what Husain is doing is the culture and tradition of Islam." You might say
that Muslims were being asked to "earn the goodwill of the majority
community."
But exactly why should all Muslims join in this "relentless campaign"? How
did this suddenly become a test of the culture and tradition of Islam?
Think about it: why should either Muslims in Maharashtra or Pandits in
Kashmir -- minorities anywhere, actually -- be asked to jump through hoops
like these?
That's easily answered: because the hoops can always be moved, the demands
can always be made, always with the surety of political gain. You see,
whatever Pandits do or don't do, it can always be said that they did not do
enough to "earn the goodwill of the majority community" (who's measuring?).
Farooq Abdullah knows well the great political benefit of that accusation.
Similarly, whatever Muslims do, it can always be said of them that they did
not "join Hindus in their relentless campaign against Husain" (again, who's
measuring?). Bal Thackeray knows well the boundless political benefit of
that accusation.
That's the true value of these vague, meaningless and ultimately sinister
demands of minorities.
The lesson in all this, it seems clear to me, is one about minorities. The
true measure of successful, vibrant Indian democracy is the situation of
its minorities. As Sikhs who lost loved ones in the 1984 riots know, as
Muslims who lost loved ones in the 1992-93 riots know, as long-suffering
lower castes know, as small fishermen all along our coasts know, and as
Kashmir's Pandits know: India has not done well by its minorities.
Therefore, India has not done well by its people.
The Thackerays and Abdullahs will not -- cannot -- lead us up and out of
there. Urged on by them, we will continue to stray into violence and
ruination. Until we find the will to recognise two things.
One, we are all minorities of one sort or another. We all have concerns, we
all have rights. Those must be respected. Two, that is a definition of,
even a tribute to, being Indian.
Those must form the basis of any solution to the tragedy of Kashmiri
Pandits. Genuine support for their cause will come from people, parties and
leaders who understand this. Nowhere else.
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