Postcard From Kashmir

This story was published as part of Outlook Magazine's 'Future Tense' issue, dated October 1, 2024. To read more stories from the Issue, click here.

Desolation

It all began with deconstruction. In 2022, the roads in Lal Chowk in Srinagar were demolished. The doors of the Press Club remained shut. JCBs blocked the way to the Ghanta Ghar (clock tower). A large area bounded with asbestos near the Ghanta Ghar was surrounded and guarded by armed forces. The construction of Naya Kashmir had begun under the Bharatiya Janata Party’s government at the Centre that had abrogated Article 370 in August 2019. All of a sudden.

Back then, the enclosure was barren except for a few dogs that occupied it.

A tiny sapling stood upright amid the rubble. An outsider or a tourist never noticed it, but we, the Kashmiris, did.

This reconstruction work around the Ghanta Ghar culminated before August 15, 2023, and grand celebrations occurred on Independence Day.

On the 77th Independence Day celebrations at the Lal Chowk, while I tried to talk to two boys—the only local youths watching the celebrations from a distance—one of the journos warned me that there were spies among the crowd.

Hundreds of tourists attended the event, swirling flags and chanting ‘Jai Shree Ram’ slogans.

There was a new clock tower. No Kashmiris stood underneath it that day. Shops remained shut.

Erasure

In 2022, the path alongside the Jhelum Bund began to be tilled. The path had two or more bunkers, and sirens from patrolling forces kept the night awake.

In 2024, I revisited the Jhelum Bund. The reconstructed cemented paths and tiled blocks had destroyed several Chinar trees. The area is now wide open, with no trees to obstruct a direct view from the opposite side of the road. This makes surveillance easier.

The construction work along the Press Club Colony in Srinagar also began in 2022 as part of the Smart City renovation. The doors to the Press Club remain locked to this day.

The red brick buildings along this road displayed nameboards of various prominent media houses.

Then, the nameboards of the media houses disappeared.

One of the media houses stated that the government had ordered the removal of all nameplates from the front as part of the city’s beautification process. They call it the Smart City Project.

In Srinagar, the Press Colony remains under 24/7 surveillance, guarded by security forces. One of the editors of a media house in Kashmir said that the real challenge is to stay afloat and not to get closed down. Through 2022, the intimidation and arrest of Kashmiri journalists continued.

After the renovations in 2023, the new landscape of the Press Colony has not only erased the presence of the press but also the stories that are silenced and the lives that continue to suffer in prisons. An unofficial handbook of changed vocabulary was imposed.

The place is revamped now and fewer trees are visible

Entering Personal Spaces: Entrances of graveyards in Srinagar are now covered with barbed wires, and bunkers can be seen outside.

No visitor has been allowed since 2022

Then and Now: The nameboard of ‘Rising Kashmir’, a media house, seen in 2022

The nameboard has gone missing in 2024

Silent Graveyards in a Shiny City

Lal Chowk, once the hub of many protests, is now a recreational space for tourists to pose. Most tourists who visit Kashmir know where to go, what to see and what to avoid. It’s their Naya Kashmir.

On account of the Amarnath Yatra, the space has also now become a sanctum shelter for the yatris (pilgrims).

What is prohibited in Naya Kashmir is the peaceful get-together of Kashmiris, the political resistance and the social gathering, leaving the parks, the gardens and social spaces bereaved of anything local.

The authorities want the graveyards to remain nameless and the barbed wires, so compliant even in the new version of Kashmir, prohibit people from entering or praying there.

The Jamia Masjid, the famous mosque in the Nowhatta Chowk, remains closed after Friday protests became a regular thing. Stone pelters no longer emerge from the many alleys.

In 2022, the mosque was completely shut and troops guarded it. Now, the mosque remains open on Friday but there is no sermon from the Mir Waiz.

“A Farce”

In this Naya Kashmir, as the Kashmiri youth sleep in depression with unemployment remaining the major reason, the lights alongside the bridge in Dalgate continue to shimmer in the night.

No Entry: The locked up door of Jamia Masjid in 2022

Hana Vahab is an independent journalist, currently based in Delhi