A Long Dream of Home: The Persecution, Exodus and Exile of Kashmiri Pandits

by Siddhartha Gigoo, Varad Sharma

Twenty-five years ago, in the winter of 1990, about four hundred thousand Pandits of Kashmir were forced to leave Kashmir, their homeland, to save their lives when militancy erupted there. Even today, they continue to live as ‘internally displaced people’ in their own country. While most Kashmiri Pandits have now carved a niche for themselves in different parts of India, several thousands are still languishing in migrant camps in and around Jammu. The stories of their struggles and plight have remained untold for years.

The authors of the memoirs in this anthology belong to four generations. Those who were born and brought up in Kashmir, and fled while they were in their forties and fifties; those who lingered on in their homes in Kashmir despite the threat to their lives; those who got displaced in their teens; and those who were born in migrant camps in exile.

These are untold narratives about the persecution of Pandits in Kashmir during the advent of militancy in 1989, the killings and kidnappings, loss of homeland, uprootedness, camp-life, struggle, survival, alienation and an ardent yearning to return to their land. These are stories about the re-discovery of their past, their ancestry, culture, and roots and moorings.

Genres: India, Nonfiction, History

352 pages, Unknown Binding

Published December 30, 2015

About the author

Siddhartha Gigoo is a Commonwealth Prize-winning author. In 2015, he won the Commonwealth Short Story Prize (Asia) for his short story, The Umbrella Man. He has written two books of poetry, three novels--The Garden of Solitude, Mehr: A Love Story, and The Lion of Kashmir--, an experimental fiction--Love in the Time of Quarantine--, and a book of short stories--A Fistful of Earth and Other Stories (longlisted for the Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award 2015). He has also co-edited two anthologies, namely A Long Dream of Home: The Persecution, Exodus and Exile of Kashmiri Pandits and Once We Had Everything: Literature in Exile. His short stories have been longlisted for Lorian Hemingway Short Story Prize, Royal Society of Literature's V.S. Pritchett Short Story Prize, and Seán O'Faoláin Short Story Prize.

Siddhartha's short films, The Last Day and Goodbye, Mayfly, have won several awards at international film festivals. His writings appear in various literary journals.

For more, visit:

https://www.siddharthagigoo.com

Reviews

[Shreya Vaid · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some books don't need a review or a rating. Some books just simply need to be devoured into and discussed at length, to understand the pain behind tears that leave a mark on the pages and between the lines of the writers. To feel their pain and loss, to come face to face with their fear and their suffering, which has not gone from last 26 years..

For 26 years, living in the memory of home which was Kashmir.


A Long Dream of Home- The Persecution, Exodus and Exile of Kashmiri Pandits is such a book that you just simply need to absorb into not expecting how interesting or entertaining it will be. When I came across the book, my motive was to see what exactly happened in the valley of Kashmir, when lacs of pandits were displaced from their homes. What made them leave and why everyone was standing like a mute spectator? Why no one questioned the scenarios unfolding against a community which was residing there from last 5000 years?

A Long Dream of Home is a collection of first hand accounts of Kashmiri Pandits who left their homes to save themselves and their coming generations. And even after 26 years, they cannot go back because they feel that as soon as the will put a foot down on that familiar soil, they will be shot dead. I have read accounts of Kashmiri Pandits before also from Rahul Pandita, Siddhartha Gigoo and Basharat Peer. But now, I have come across some new writers who can chronicle the pain of their community through A Long Dream of Home.


The book starts with the story written by Indu Bhishan Zutshi "She Was Killed Because She Was An Informant; No Harm Will Come To you" where you get to know the brutal murder of nurse Sarla Bhatt. A spine chilling account of daughter of Shambu Nath Bhatt, held captive for four days, sexually abused and murdered by militants who were sure that she was a police informant. The body of the girl was not even allowed to touch. More pain came when they weren't able to find a place to give last rites to Sarla. But the family managed somehow. A painful stab at your heart, Indu Bhishan's account of Sarla Bhatt will leave you shocked at the atrocities that went down in the once peaceful place, known as Kashmir.

A Long Dream of Home also captures the account of Pran Kishore and his experiences while shooting for tv series Gul Gulshan Gulfam. He shares his experiences when he had to shoot for series amidst the atmosphere of threats and bullets. B.L Zutshi has contributed knowledge from Camp Schools and Colleges for the Displaced Students. Ramesh Hangloo and his Radio Sharda is a household name for all Pandits residing in camps, to give them a piece of their home to hang onto. One of the best account is of Arvind Gigoo in his days of parting. An effortless style of writing, story within a story when mistrust was the only way of communication in the valley.


Like this only, many other stories shared by people who saw transition of their Muslim neighbors into enemies, their fears of walking right next to and supporting a Pandit. Stones being pelted at their homes whenever India lost a cricket match, teenagers working as informants for militants, stopping them on their way and interrogating them. Lecherous ways of looking at their daughters, hit list being pasted at the gates of their home, slogans against non Muslims and India blaring from loudspeakers of mosques, living in a constant fear that who will be shot next. Militants forcing inhabitants to set their watches on Pakistan time, brutal murders out of the blue, and the worst of all, authorities standing like mute spectators, turning their faces away from the atrocities.

A Long Dream of Home is not just a book chronicling stories from exodus of Kashmiri Pandits, it also covers their lives and experiences during the "ethnic cleansing" and after exile. How a wife who has planted Kashmiri roses in her garden, took a sapling with her to the camps of Displaced Kashmiris, so that she can have a piece of her home which she might never see again. How a professor mourns the loss of his collection of books that got left behind, how now millions of Kashmiri Pandits have a different permanent address.


As I mentioned at the start, A Long Dream of Home is a book that doesn't need a review or rating. It's a collection of stories that needs to read and heard by people, who are living within comfortable quarters and forgetting a community who has been displaced and forced out of their homes.

And even after 26 years, they haven't received their justice.

[Avinash Singh · Rating 5 out of 5]

A collection of memoirs by Kashmiri Hindus who tell the tale of barbarity they faced, the apathy they received and the agonizing struggle they went through to rebuild their lives from scratch.

[Kavya Chilukuri · Rating 5 out of 5]

No amount of wiki and news reading can equal narratives from a first person perspective. This is precisely what the book does.
It is a compilation of thoughts / stories by several exiled Pandits spanning across the three generations that had to bear the brunt of this tragedy.
The thing that stood up the most was the resilience shown by this community that was robbed of its livelihood, ethos and most importantly - their homes.
It just makes you wonder what the State and Central government were doing when a tragedy was unravelling at such a large scale!
This truly is a must read for everyone - class, religion, creed notwithstanding.

[Rohan Sangodkar · Rating 4 out of 5]

Technically, this book a is set of memoirs by Kashmiri Pandits who were subjected to the unjust and faced exodus. Hence the aforementioned author duo did not write but edited this.
This is not a very famous book. There are many books about the Kashmir issue which are discussed in depth. But what makes this book unique is the raw emotions and narration of what exactly happened. This book does not try to investigate how the issue happened, rather than it focuses on what happened.
It is very heart-wrenching to read a few of the stories. Exodus is not just a physical departure, it is a multilayered loss of and the quest for identity.
The very fact that history in Indian curricula ends in 1947, books like these should be read more. Indian freedom fight was important, so was Emergency, Indo-Pak, Indo-China, Kashmir issue.

[Anil Dhingra · Rating 4 out of 5]

A well compiled book written by Kashmiri pandits about their plight after 1989 when the political events in the valley forced them out of their homes to become refugees in their own country.
A captivating and illuminating account of the migration and persecution of half a million people rendered homeless and stripped of their dignity.
It's sad to read about the complete failure of governance in both protecting them in the valley as well as rehabilitation in miserable camps in Jammu and udhampur.

[Vivek · Rating 5 out of 5]

It is hard to imagine what kashmiri Pandits haves gone through since the Independence of India. we as an biggest democracy of the world should be ashamed of what was going on with them in valley, their own home. Thousands of families had to take shelter in refugees camps in Jammu. Government of India were so weak to take stand and act against the violence and the terrorist activities going on in valley.

[Ajay · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this book to know the lifes of Kashmiri Pandits. Must read book

[Boipoka · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's an *important* book, but I can't call it a *good* book. It is excellent testimony from men and (very few) women about the wrongs they/their families have faced. There is (understandable) anger, resentment and bitterness. But that alone does not make for a compelling read.

It's called "A Long Dream of Home", yet I didn't feel longing, or love for their home. And that's not to say the authors don't long for their homeland - I read a Twitter exchange between a few authors featured here. And those 4 tweets expressed more longing than their writings here. It felt like some of the authors here were so focused on proving they were wronged, they removed every other emotion from their work. My grandparents have had the exact same experiences seven decades ago in what was soon to be East Pakistan. I have heard them recount similar memories and express the kind of longings this book told me the authors felt. And while they were as bitter and resentful as these authors are, their stories also had love, and hope, and a lot of other emotions. And I could see their longing for home - without anyone ever saying it out loud. With this book, not so much.

Ultimately I think there were three problems that seriously hampered this book, and made it a 2.5 star read -

(a) the authors were writing in a foreign language that they have only used for official purposes. The stories just didn't flow in English. I wish they had done interviews in their native language and created an oral history - then gotten somebody to translate and make it a book. It would have been a much, much, better book

(b) the authors were very unwilling to be vulnerable. For example, one of the author (who had survived three bomb blasts and apparently taken them in his stride) mentions going back home and immediately hiding in his neighbours house - never once mentioning what was so different this time, that made him so scared. The lack of vulnerability meant I couldn't connect with these people (and it doesn't help that all of them apparently led incredibly privileged lives) - and the book didn't impact me as much as it should have

(c) The lack of diversity. Almost every author featured here were educated, well-to-do men - from a very specific socioeconomic class. I wish there were more of the women's stories (I would love to listen to the granny who inserted snakes into all her stories!), there were more of stories from people of lower socioeconomic backgrounds (even if the Pandits were the traditional power holders, there are always the poor and the dispossessed). Instead I got account after account that felt exactly the same - and bled into each other. If it was testimony in court, the repetition would be useful. But as a book, it just made reading it a slog.

[Preetam Chatterjee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Book: A Long Dream of Home: The Persecution, Exodus and Exile of Kashmiri Pandits
Author: Siddhartha Gigoo and Varad Sharma
Publisher: ‎ Bloomsbury India (30 December 2015)
Language: ‎ English
Paperback: ‎ 352 pages
Item Weight: ‎ 380 g
Price: 2800/-

This is beyond doubt an account penned in blood and tears.

Saraswati mahabhage vidye kamala locane/
Viswarupi visalaksi vidyam dehi saraswati //

(“O extremely exalted Goddess of Learning, O lotus-eyed Saraswati, O you, who exists in assorted forms, and who has large eyes, grant us the boon of knowledge.”)

The above hymn is recited in honour of the Goddess of Knowledge, Saraswati, whose other name is Sharda Devi.

The antique temple of Sharada is located in PoK’s Neelam Valley (Kishenganga Valley), at a distance of just about 100 kms from Baramulla and about 76 kms inside the LoC.

The temple takes its name from village Shardi located near the union of Kishenganga and Madhumati Rivers. After the occupation of this area by Pakistan in 1947, piligrimage to this hallowed place was stopped.

The Saraswat Brahmans of Kashmir, also known as Kashmiri Pandits, are the original inhabitants of the Valley of Kashmir, with a history of more than 5000 years, dating back beyond the Neelmat era, almost contemporaneous to the Vedic civilisation of India.

Ancestors of Kashmiri Pandits lived on the banks of the great Saraswati River which flowed in the north-west region of India. Subsequent to its drying up around 1900 BCE, these people moved north and found shelter in Kashmir Valley.

Due to a very encouraging environment during the reign of Hindu kings in the first two millennia after they settled in Kashmir, these people developed a discrete literary culture that survives to the present day. Originally, they were and continue to be known as ‘Bhattas’.

The term “Bhatta is derived from ancient Sanskrit (Prakrit) name bhartri, which means doctor, scholar or intellectual.” Pandit too means a learned person. In Bahristan-e-Shahi, the author says that the local population held Kashmiri Brahmans in high esteem. In fact; the foreign clerics would tell the locals that the Muslim ulema (clerics) are actually Muslim-Brahmans.

Over the centuries, the Hindus of Kashmir (known by the exonym ‘Pandits’) have faced maltreatment by successive Muslim rulers.

From 1389 to 1413, Sultan Sikandar ‘Butshikan’ (destroyer of idols), descendant of Shah Mir, founder of the Shah Miri dynasty of Kashmir, unleashed a reign of fear, imposing jizya, ravaging ancient temples and compulsorily converting Pandits to Islam.

He established Sikandarpora on the spoils of the temples which he razed to the ground. To break out of religious conversion, thousands of Pandits fled to Kishtwar and Bhadarwah in Jammu region. Those who didn’t depart or refused to be converted to Islam were burned alive at a place near Rainawari in Srinagar.

To this day, the place is known as Bhatta Mazar (the graveyard of the Pandits).

From 1413 to 1420, Butshikan’s eldest son, Noor Khan (who assumed the title Sultan Ali Shah) continued his father’s policy of bigotry towards Pandits. Noor Khan’s brother, Zain-ul-Abidin (Budshah), succeeded to the throne in 1420. Pandit Shri Bhat, a physician who cured the king of a disease, influenced him to turn sympathetic towards Pandits.

Zain-ul-Abidin abolished the jizya and allowed the Pandits to rebuild their temples. Pandits flourished under his rule which lasted half a century. Thereafter, the Chak and the Mughal dynasties took over. The tyranny continued during their rules especially during Aurangzeb’s reign from 1658 to 1707.

The period from 1753 to 1819 was another shadowy period in the history of Kashmir.

During this time, Afghans under Ahmad Shah Durrani ruled Kashmir and hounded Pandits by reintroducing jizya and forcing them to accept Islam.

The Afghan rulers made coercion of Pandits their political policy. In 1819, Mirza Pandit Dhar and Pandit Birbal Dhar, who were revenue collectors under the zealot Afghan governor Azim Khan, secretly persuaded Maharaja Ranjit Singh of Lahore to annex Kashmir to bring an end to the Afghan rule.

Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s forces under Diwan Chand, Gulab Singh of Jammu and Hari Singh Nalwa defeated the last Afghan governor Jabbar Khan.

From 1819 to 1947, Kashmir was under the Sikh and Dogra regimes.

In October 1947, during Maharaja Hari Singh’s rule, tribal militias from Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province, supported by the Pakistani army, invaded Kashmir, killing hundreds of Hindus.

To save Kashmir from Pakistani hostility and an impending occupation, Maharaja Hari Singh signed the Instrument of Accession with India on 26 October 1947, paving the way for the Indian Army to enter Kashmir to defeat the invaders.

With the outbreak of Pakistan-sponsored armed insurgency in Kashmir in 1989, Pandits became soft targets for the militant outfits who wanted to wipe out the ‘Indian element’ and liberate Kashmir from India. Many Pandits were on the hit lists of several militant groups.

The night of 19 January 1990 was one of terror for Pandits. Kashmir resonated with anti-India and anti-Pandit slogans. Mass protests and aggressive clashes between militants/protestors and security forces crippled the state administration. The law and order situation collapsed.

In April 1990, Hizb-ul Mujahideen gave the Pandits an ultimatum to leave Kashmir in 36 hours or face dire consequences. Misgiving, disloyalty and suspicion divided the Muslims and the Pandits. Both the communities stood divided on religious and ideological lines. Militants kidnapped and killed numerous regular and high-flying Kashmiri Pandits.

This created so much terror and dread among the Pandit families that they started leaving their homes in Kashmir.

Some, who didn’t want to leave, sent their children away and lingered on in their homes for some time, hoping that the turmoil would end. Some of the Pandits managed to carry a few belongings while most left empty-handed in terror, unable to pack even their necessary household possessions.

The security forces including the police were unable to provide safety to the minority community. The authorities in the state and the centre made no effort to prevent the atrocities committed against the Pandits.

Targeted kidnappings and killings, rapes and massacres of Pandits who lingered on became a customary affair. The butchery of Pandits by militants in Sangrampora, Budgam in March 1997, Gool in June 1997, Wandhama near Ganderbal in January 1998 and Nadimarg, Pulwama in March 2003, made it clear that Pandits were not safe in their own land.

By the end of 1990, about half a million Pandits had left their homes in Kashmir.

The displaced people sought sanctuary in Jammu and adjoining districts. Thousands found shelter in temples, sheds, barns, canvas tents and schools. Many others took rooms on rent.

The part played by the people of Jammu was praiseworthy at those critical times. The displaced, jobless Pandits, many of them agriculturists, lived on the meagre dole given to them by the government. They suffered in ‘migrant camps’ and private rented accommodations in Jammu and nearby districts.

Lives changed overnight. The camp-dwellers lived in appalling conditions in canvas tents and ramshackle one-room tenements that lacked even basic civic amenities.

In these cramped spaces there was neither privacy nor security and safety. It was a life of degradation, deprivation and indignity. Year after year, the exiles struggled, nurturing hope and battling a deep sense of alienation and desolation. Thousands perished due to diseases, mental sicknesses, heat strokes, sunstrokes, antagonistic climate and accidents.

During the nineties, Kashmir passed through its darkest years of conflict and political upheaval in contemporary history. The popular uprising of the Muslims of Kashmir against the Indian state was met with force by the security forces. Hartals, ‘civil curfews’, mass protests, stone-pelting, bomb blasts, encounters, strikes, violent clashes between the militants and the security forces, army crackdowns and detentions, became a way of life in Kashmir.

Army and paramilitary forces launched full-scale operations to curb militancy. Thousands of Kashmiri Muslims—young and old—lost their lives. Kashmir became one of the most militarised zones in the world and a very dangerous place to live and visit. The cycle of protests and violence continues even now. There is no political solution in sight to restore peace, stability and normalcy in Kashmir.

This book marks the end of twenty-five long years of silence of a community whose predicaments, ordeals and valid demands have not only been forgotten by the nation, but also not even addressed adequately by successive governments.

The stories of the struggles and plights of Kashmiri Pandit exiles have remained untold. The old are fading away, taking away with them the untold tales — narratives of who they were, what they faced, what they lost, how they struggled and what remains now.

Those who were born and brought up in exile are struggling to understand their own identities and the history of their elders. It is this burden of history that they will have to carry for the rest of their lives.

The writers of the memoirs in this anthology belong to three generations:

1) the old and the middle-aged who were born and brought up in Kashmir, and forced to leave while they were in their forties, fifties and sixties;

2) those who got displaced in their teens; and

3) those who were born in migrant camps in exile. The young generation of Pandits born and brought up in exile is living off an inherited memory.

This book is divided into four sections:

*Part I: Nights of Terror features narratives about what Pandits witnessed and faced in Kashmir from 1989 to 1991.

*Part II: Summers of Exile features memoirs about how the displaced Pandits struggled to survive during the past two and a half decades in exile.

*Part III: Days of Parting features memoirs about the horrific events and circumstances leading to the mass exodus of Pandits from Kashmir.

*The writings in Part IV: Seasons of Longing reveal the longing and desire of the Pandits to return to their homes in Kashmir.

The exodus of Kashmiri Pandits remains one of the darkest chapters in the history of contemporary India. 1990 (when the exodus started) is a watershed year in the history of Kashmiri Pandits.

The uninhibited killing of the Kashmiri Pandits was a well-planned and calculated move to racially rinse out the valley of the Hindus, with the aim of establishing ‘Nizam-e-Mustafa’, a step that would make its merger with Pakistan easier.

By forcing the Pandits to take flight, those who orchestrated these events, seemed to be succeeding in their mission.

As a first step, thousands of people sought shelter at ‘Geeta Bhavan’ in Jammu, while others headed straight for Delhi, to find shelter in similar camps.

A large number of them were housed in hurriedly prepared refugee camps in Jammu and Delhi. Thousands of families had to live in these camps; in tattered tents under unlivable conditions.

Little did they realise that over two decades later they would continue to live in those refugee camps. Most of them had left the Valley in panic and confusion, hoping that the situation would normalise, enabling them to return to their homes soon. Days, months and years rolled by, but their hopes remained unfulfilled.

Most Kashmiri Pandits left behind everything they had in the Valley. A large number of them lost their near and dear ones in the violence, specifically directed at them.

Among Kashmiri Pandits there were many (mostly retired and old people) who had, as a routine, left the Valley to be with their children or other relatives living outside the Kashmir, to avoid the harsh winter.

When they left in late December, they carried with them only the essential clothing, etc., which would suffice them for the next few months, after which they would return to the Valley. It was during this period of their temporary absence from Kashmir that Kashmiri Pandits in the Valley were forced to flee.

These people lost almost everything.

The year 2015 marked the 25th year of their exile. While many Kashmiri Pandits are settled in different parts of India and some other countries, several thousands are still languishing in the township for the displaced at Jagti near Nagrota and in other camps in the Jammu province of the J&K state. Many of them continue to live as refugees in their own country, still unsure about where they belong.

Continually plagued by a sense of mortification and dislocation, their long-cherished yearning for a peaceful return is still unfulfilled.

What bottomline does this book preach? It preaches the three following points:

1) Even today thousands of Pandits oscillate between despair and hope, and pray for normalcy to return to Kashmir. In the current political scenario Pandits are a forgotten entity - the young and the middle-aged visit Kashmir as tourists and pilgrims now. About two thousand youths have been given non-transferable jobs in government departments in Kashmir. They live in rented and transit accommodations in their own land because there are no homes to go back to anymore.

2) They can’t take their families there. Thousands of houses abandoned by the Pandits lie in a dilapidated condition. Hundreds of temples in Kashmir have been destroyed. Kashmir, ravaged by two-and-a-half decades of terrorism, militancy and counter-insurgency, continues to be a flashpoint between India and Pakistan.

3) The displaced and homeless Pandits, who are the original inhabitants of Kashmir, find themselves caught in a vortex. There hasn’t been much progress on their return to and rehabilitation in Kashmir. Their demand for truth, reconciliation and justice has remained unheard for years.

There is an old Arabian Proverb which says: “It is not the road ahead that wears you out - it is the grain of sand in your shoe.”

The grain of sand in the shoe of Pandits was the convoluted memory of an environment wherein acquaintances, neighbours, friends, colleagues, co-workers, business partners, teammates and class-fellows turned into their (Pandits’) actual killers or their collaborators.

The grain of sand in the shoe of Pandits was also an unwelcoming future that stared them in the face.

Alarm bells are ringing yet again, right to this very day. Has history taught us anything?

A must read tome. Grab a copy if you choose.

[Priyanka Soni · Rating 4 out of 5]

What I used to think about Kashmir struggles did change after reading this book

[Akshit · Rating 4 out of 5]

Few books, like this one, which is a collection of memoirs, are beyond "review." So, I'll just express my afterthoughts. There isn't a page, a story narrated and an account of events retold which didn't touched some raw nerves and disheartened me. Some stories left me gripped in thoughts about the Kashmiri Hindu community with which all this happened while some made me cry.
In the end, we can just salute the fortitude of Kashmiri Pandit community for surviving and thriving and pray for the day when they will be able to return to their ancestral homeland and ring the bells in temples and rebuild their culture again, some day.
But, but, but...we are just helpless, aren't we? What can we do but to carry the load of secularism, isn't it?

[Iqra Tasmiae]

http://www.openthemagazine.com/articl...