(Jan 15, 2:20pm)
My first narrative piece from Kashmir, The Atonement !!
http://www.kashmirlife.net/atonement/
"A couple of hours from now, Srinagar will be dark and frigid. Farooq Posh will stand in the cold in the basement, killing time until his sons had returned. “In Muzaffarabad, they used a motorbike to go to nearby markets. Today they walk to home for over an hour from Lal Chowk,” he told me ruefully. From his house in the outskirts of Srinagar, the Himalayas seem to gherao the city like a giant’s army on vigil. On the other side of the Himalayas, across the Pir Panjal, is a nation which they call India. Farooq’s story is not known to her people. They haven’t heard about Nisar, his dead sister or his mourning wife and children. They know nothing about the long tragedy that had befallen the thousands of Farooqs and Nisars and their hapless brethren. But one day, when Farooq or Nisar or their children will pick up a stone again, or fire a gunshot again, in mindless attempt to tell the world about their plight, the sleeping conscience of the Indian mainland will at once be awakened. Not to plead their case. But to demand yet another round of ‘atonement’."
XXX
My first narrative piece from Kashmir, The Atonement !!
http://www.kashmirlife.net/atonement/
"A couple of hours from now, Srinagar will be dark and frigid. Farooq Posh will stand in the cold in the basement, killing time until his sons had returned. “In Muzaffarabad, they used a motorbike to go to nearby markets. Today they walk to home for over an hour from Lal Chowk,” he told me ruefully. From his house in the outskirts of Srinagar, the Himalayas seem to gherao the city like a giant’s army on vigil. On the other side of the Himalayas, across the Pir Panjal, is a nation which they call India. Farooq’s story is not known to her people. They haven’t heard about Nisar, his dead sister or his mourning wife and children. They know nothing about the long tragedy that had befallen the thousands of Farooqs and Nisars and their hapless brethren. But one day, when Farooq or Nisar or their children will pick up a stone again, or fire a gunshot again, in mindless attempt to tell the world about their plight, the sleeping conscience of the Indian mainland will at once be awakened. Not to plead their case. But to demand yet another round of ‘atonement’."
XXX
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