It was a friday afternoon!

It was not just another day when i uselessly move around places like office, market, bus stand and narrow streets to make out a meaning of life in Kashmir. It was a friday when masses gather for prayers. I had been told by my professor to avoid certain places on this day. On every friday security is beefed up from what it is on any other day for the mere reason that mass gathering takes place and 'popular sentiment' in Kashmir finds expression on this day.  

For past three weeks my religious identity have come out strongly in the interactions I have had with learned and wise people whom academicians mark as 'common people'. The feeling of being a hindu and part of majority community (in mainland India) never came to my mind so strongly. I can credit for that blissful ignorance to multicultural and multireligious friends I have had. Religious identity was limited to being born into a family which is hindu. I am not even an active practioner of the religious identity ascribed to me. Once in a while I used to go for the spiritual retreat I feel in religious places. For that matter honestly I frequent religious places of most of the religions practised in India. The spirituality and humbling experience I get, is irrespective of the religion which legally owns the religious place.

Kashmir is different and I have been constantly reminded of my religious identity in subtle ways. A small experience in a tea shop, where i frequented to have chola bhatura, on succesive days gave me reason enough that there is a thing or two communal in the air of Kashmir. While purchasing a plate of samosa the lady asks the tea stall owner, “bhaiya ye hotel hindu ka hai ya musulman ka”. The tea stall owners answered making a meek face, “hindu ka hai”. That moment people sitting in the tea stall smiled the matter off in a light humor. One old man cracked a joke “umar humari badh rahi hai aur farak inpe pad raha hai”. I have seen old age getting reflected in the wisdom and humor of such old men and women many a times. The experience lightened the air which i saw getting communal. The day next to this experience was more shocking. While being served chola bhatura in the tea stall on the next day, when waiter wanted to give me a particular glass, the tea stall owner chided him and asked him, “ye hindu hai isey saaf glass de”!

On that friday me and my friend cum colleague have walked some distance in search of a dhaba where we could get paranthas. After a long walk and search for a descent and cheap dhaba we landed up at one in lal chowk. Dhabas have not remained the traditional dhabas which were affordable and cheap and especially catered to working class. Today they have become fad and entrepreneurs have banked on it. Dhaba has been made synonymous with Punjabi cuisines like butter chicken et al. The place had been figured by me during the bus ride back home to Hyderpora the previous day. Do not remember the name of the place but it was run by Punjabis. It is easy to know where a person has lived his life or where he is from by his pronunciation. It is difficult to guess about people who have lived in multiple places and specially cities. Their identity too becomes fluid like their movement between the places. I too had found myself difficult at times to tell people about where I am from. In my generation most of the people introduce themselves about their native place as the one where they had spent large part of their childhood. But there are some confused characters (like me!) too who find it difficult to tell where they are from. Their personality is such that it is not characterstic of any particular place, it is amalgamation of many places considerably. Such type of characters have adapted well and had never held identity of any place rigidly.

While having paranthas in the dhaba we were looking at people who were walking past lal chowk. It is always good to see people engrossed in activities from a vantage. May be it gives you a momentary pleasure of being powerful and almighty. It is absurd! It is easy to see guys having intense hormonal imbalance looking and wooing every girl walking past their way. Vendors selling with a broad smile, dyers flapping the dyed dupattas, there is so much of life on the streets that it can enliven even a dead soul.

After having the lunch we started walking back to our office. Everything looked normal. On reaching Maisuma area the air changed a bit, protestors were shouting slogan against anti-Islam movie made by US based Director Becile. We thought of watching it for some time and then move. It was only a minute after this that CRPF personnel started blocking the main gate of their unit in that area. Some said aaney do aaney do. To this we turned our heads and saw a mob coming to that side. It did not take a second to realise that stone pelting which we had heard of untill now will become a eternal memory in this Kashmir visit. It was a shock, exhilaration and fear. It was for the first time I realised that I stand party to none. A neutral person who did not know anyone there at that moment. I asked my friend and colleague to walk through diferent street than through which the mob was coming. Steps naturally pace up when a slight threat to life gives a glimpse. We were to cross that bridge which would have put us in the down town area but the mob was coming back along our direction, as the retaliation from CRPF had started. Fear from CRPF was one and side by side thoughts of my hindu religious identity were stirring my mind. I have had never felt threatened in being around minority (muslims, sikhs, christians) population as i always belonged to the majority population in the areas I have lived. This was the first experience of feeling like a minority in a place. Past events and frictional relation which two religious communities hold affects your state of mind in turbulent situations. On a normal day interacting with my muslim colleague and friends I have never had these feelings. But here I was in a different city with strangers all around who were pelting stone symbolically to protest against the state repression. All these people suddenly appeared threatening to me.

In the middle of this my colleague suggested we go back to our office and we had taken 5-6 steps also in that direction. But it clicked to me how hostile and sensitive down town area is and i realised how grave it might become going there. So I decided to walk away towards the Jehangir Chowk over bridge. While walking to Jehangir Chowk we could see people running with stones in their hands smiling with a zeal. They were cool about the situation and appeared to me seasoned. But all the shops and windows and doors of the houses were shut. We paced really fast and reached the Jehangir Chowk over bridge. The escape was a big relief. Realisation of how scared am I to lose my life dawned like an enlightenment.

At Jehangir Chowk life was normal, people walking and vehicles zooming past. This was a memorable day, as life lived in those few minutes shook me to core. The harsh realities of life for people living there came as real-time glimpse for me. While fagging I made a resolution that I will never let this experience of a friday afternoon in Kashmir go down the memory lane!