ABSTRACT

The relentless conflict of Kashmir has now stepped into its third decade and had affected the lives of entire
valley. As Kashmir has always been of interest to writers and the unending conflict has evoked the writers to
expound the reality in the form of literature. The discourse on Kashmir, and its protracted conflict, has evoked a
whole spectrum of writing- both literary and non- literary. Owing to many contending discourses, most of these
writing have come up with their own subjective perspectives regarding the conflict, especially in terms of
experience and reality. Written from various positions, both hegemonic and participatory, these writings are
preoccupied with rhetoric that results in the non-rendering of many significant aspects of lived experiences.
However, with the emergence of many indigenous voices now, we are witnessing fresh perspectives as these
voices aim to portray their lived experiences of the conflict, and hence offer a break from the previous
narrratives.In the light of the analysis of the novel The Collaborator by Mirza Waheed,Curfewed Night:The
frontline memoir of life,love and war in Kashmir by Basharat Peer and Half-Mother by Shahnaz Bashir .I argue
that how an indigenous voices endeavours to potray the many shades of this conflict.I am to examine how these
novels fall within the ambit of” Resistance Literature” as it tries foreground many complex issues like identity,
justice,struggle, drepression,and oppression which are usually absent in the mainstream Narratives on/of
Kashmir.In doing so,I draw the attention to the fact that how the novels give an alternative and heterogeneous
account of the history and experience related to the conflict.

Keywords: Armed conflict, history, resistance, oppression, disappearance, schizophrenia,

Kashmir, identity
Chapter 1:

The contentious historical, social, cultural, and political perception of the Kashmir conflict has evoked myriad
responses and endeavors of exploration in both literary and non- literary realms.Since the violent conflict in
Kashmir , among many other factors , has its roots in political factors, any political approach to the event gives
rise to the possibilities of partisanship and partiality.Therefore, any purely political interpretation or approach to
the experience of the conflict might fall in the line within these contending parameters. The vast majority of the
writing on Kashmir ,written from these positions , come up with their own monolithic projections regarding the
realities of the conflict. However,we are now witnessing the emergence of many indigenous voices which
endeavors to portray the mny shades of experie nce of this conflict.Prominent among these voices/writers are
Mirza waheed,Basharat Peer ,Shafi Ahmad.Rahul Pandita,and Siddhartha Gigoo,allof whom write in English

.In the recent past, Kashmir have begun to reflect on the conflict in which they have been engulfed since 1989
in a variety of literary narratives that include poetry, novels, and short stories.Written in Kashmiri, urdu, and
English, these literary narrative struggle to give voice to the individual and social suffering caused by the
conflict.I decided to revisit some of the novels in English about/from Kashmir that have emerged in the oast
decades, with a particular eye to how they present the traumas of the recent past.

This chapter tries to argue, in the light of analysis of novel The Collaborator by Mirza Waheed ,how it offers a
fresh perspective on the reality of the conflict through literary imagination by attempting to foreground the
humane and profound aspects which are absent in the mainstream narratives.Born and brought up in Srinagar
of the 1980s and 1990s, Miza Waheed witnessed the transition of Kashmir from calm to calamity.This
experience in his home state, along with his perceptions of its as a journalist, senitised him to the sordid,subtle
realities of life in Kashmir The Collaborator is his debut novel.This novel is set in the Kashmir in the early
1990s,in the village of Nowgam, near the Line of Control (LOC).The novel has nameless ,17 year old narrator
as its protagonist ,who is the son of village sarpanch .This young boy has four close friends –Hussain
,Gul,Mohammad and Ashfaq.In the realatively peaceful times preceding militancy, the narrator spends an
enjoyable childhood with rhese friends ,playing cricket on lush green fields and swimming in fresh waters. They
don’t have care in the world. With the armed uprising , the narrators friends, like other Kashmiri youth, cross
into the Pakistan for armed training imparted by various militant organisations.Their aim is to return as trained
fighters and join the insurgency against Indian rule. The narrator is a solitary figure left behind who recounts
past memories of the times spent with his friends.As militancy gains momentum,and the indian army intensifies
its operations against militants,arrest and encounters become routine for Nowgam’s inhabitant .in confrontation
the army arrestes, torchers and kills two residence of Nowgam for their suspected links with militants. Fearing
reprisal and persecution by the soldiers,almost all the families in the village flee to the places outside the valley
.The narrator can only dwell sadly upon the isolation of his family and the novelists brings out the joyful past
and the desolate present. The physical beauty of the landscape .This recounts what Edward said says at the very
beginnings of culture and imperialism:

Appeals to the past are among the commonst of strategies in interpretations of the present … the main idea is
the that even as we must fully comprehend the pastness of the past, there is no just way in which the past can be
quarantined from the present. Past and the present inform each other ,each implies the other and ,in the totally
ideal sense, each co-exists with the other.(1-2)

This becomes apparent in the novel when he goes down the valley to identify the militants killed by the indian
army, and describes the present scene around as that of “almost inhuman postures and a grotesque
intermingling of broken limbs…Bare wounds, holes, dark and visceral, and limbless, armless, even headless,
torsos… with “Wretched human remains (lying)on the green grass like cracked toys”(8)

Waheed tends to use the protagonist’s perceptions and his persona to convey the larger picture of
contemporary reality. The anonymity of the narrator makes him the representative image for the his people
,and it is through him that waheed depicts the brutal realities of the conflict.The young narrator’s anonymity
and isolation foreground the loss of the personal and social identity in a situation of military
oppression.Compelled by ciccumstances to stay on in the deserted village ,he left with no choice but to enter
into collaboration with the very force that has oppressed others into fleeing from their roots.Living in Nowgam
at his fathers insistence, the narrator’s life of complete isolation and estrangement from the world is
highlighted in the stark image of “militarized wilderness”(11).It is the reflection of kashmir’s rural hinterland in
the early 1990s when the military intruded into and controlled people’s lives during its anti-insurgency
operations.

The Collaborator vehemently rejects the Indian and Pakistan nationalists discourses on Kashmir as it brings out
the diffuseness of trauma for those whose lives are destroyed by these nationalists narratives.As the protagonist
silently screams at the end of the novel,”to hell with the Indians…to hell with Pakistanis, to hell with the Line
of Control…to hell with the jihad, and to hell with to burning, smoldering hell with everything.”

An incomprehension of trauma, which often descends into madness, runs through this novels.

The ruthless captain Kadian in the figure created by the novelist to highlight this intrusion and control He
approaches the narrrators father ,asking for son to work for the army.It is an offer he dare not decline:”I knew ,
and my father knew ,too ,in that very first moment,in that very meeting with the captain, that we had to do
exactly what we were told .We just knew”(256).Survival was more important than resistance as the narrator
became the reluctant collaborator.His job was to identify militants killed by the army as they tried to cross into
Kashmir over the LOC and also fears the possibility of coming across his friends dead bodies.It is this tragic
irony that the title symbolically reflects.
Ambiguities and contradictions mark the narrator’s character and actions.for one , he constantly wavers
between filial responsibility and desire to join the militants;his mind alternates between a questionable loyality
to the indian army and his undimished love for for his friends-turned-militants.while at his frightening work
involving dismembered corpses, his thoughts vacillae between macabre present and idyllic past.on one hand ,he
his employer,captain kadian, as one who “has sinned,and done horrible, horrible wrong”,but on the other ,he is
jolted by the knowledge that kadian “ may have killed hundreds , thousands of us, this man who makes people
disappeare, this man who cannot do anything but kill”.(287)though he is a witness to horror, he is helpless in
resisting a complex situation that summed up the dilemma of kashmir’s populace in those days.

As the narrator grows up in his frontrier village,he gradually comes to terms with the idea that the border
dividing Pakistan occupied Kashmir (POK) and jammu and kashmir is not really a border in the conventional
sense;it is an arbitrary demarcation which has not only divided the state between india and pakistan, but has
also been a scene of btterrible confrontation between the two countries in the form of threewars.The
arbitrariness of this defacto border,as perceived by the kashmiris, is reflected in the novel in the novel in the
words of an elderly man named Shaban,who speaks of the land as one terrority ,one place, one landscape that
opened up to all its inhabitants, and which now stood inexplically fragmented, a space that two nations vie for
occupation.His thoughts are reminiscent of an episode in Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children where Tai
marches to the border where india and Pakistan are fighting over Kashmir, and asserts”Kashmir for
kashmir’(36).Before getting killed in the battle,Tai decries this forcible initiation of Kashmir into a seemingly
irreversible imbroglio and becomes a symbolic martyre in the cause of resisting intervention in his identity.in
an almost ironic reversal of Ta’s situation ,The Collaborator’s protagonist ,however, is caught in a situation
where he has completely lost the scene of his identity and suffering from psychological scars.Claire Chambers
observes that the novel is ‘a dark take on the Bildungsroman’as “the novel charts the boy’s ‘progress’ from
shock and revulsion at the dead bodies , to communing with the dead people , even lying beside them ;to not
really noticing them as he becomesinured to the work’(11)

The novel transcends the narrators’s story by fictionally re-creating people’s lives under the shadow of
insurgency and oppression . The story is as much about the narrator as about himself as the space /place he
occupies.His tale becomes the story of his people ,his voice echoes their voices , his descriptions resound the
perspectives of both the oppressor and the oppressed .Thus ,every character can be seen as a participant in a
regional and political history .Kashmir’s armed conflict also brought in its wake tremendous changes in the soc
io-cultural life,especially human relations .Kashmir cultural ethos has awlays placed a premium on deference to
the elders .The narrator is shown to be caught in a dilemma .His life has run its course on three distinct and
markedly different levels.One is his existence of living through the uncertainties and the terror of
militancy;another concern is that his family life is marked by the father-son tussle; the third is his fascination
for the militants who have chosen to confront oppression. He has to reconcile all three as the reality of his
existence, ,which symbolizes the larger political and social conflict that has overwhelmed Kashmiri society
.Instruemental in this situation are the political and military pressures brought about by the armed conflict.It is
the narrator ‘s father who disapprove of the violent resistance of the militants:’I have seen this before, son seen
it all, nothing happens in the end, you know, nothing’(27)His words bring out generational difference and also
outlook,and points to how the older generation inducing politicians ,tends to be more conciliatory, more willing
to endeavor within peaceful and democratic channels ;this is in starkcontrast to the attitudes shown by the
young men who are draw drawn towards violence and see it as a quick solution to the problem.This position
expressed by the protagonist’s father represents the large section of Kashmir ‘s older generation which is lost in
the veneration of Sheikh Abdullah, and tend to most pacifist in its attitude .The elders traditional values ,like
difference and consensus ,had served as symbol of social change authority that sustained and perpetuated the
sense of community solidarity. It underlined a social structure primary based on filiation where a regard for
shared social relations. In the conflict however, such traditional structures of authority were radically modified
by the prevailing circumstances of the gun culture. The younger generation had attained a political awareness
and orientation that was far more affirmative and confrontational. The novel contains father son duo who
symbolize this dichotomy. The father Iftikar Ali Karra is described as an old “Congress Wallah”.Who
constantly disapproves of militancy because of his political inclination towards India. The son, Zulfikar Ali
despite his father’s disapproval of his father and prospects of a luxurious life, becomes a top militant ,only to be
killed into a fake encounter. This is after being lured into surrender, a common trap by the army to do away
with militants. In this episode the gun attains a symbolic significance as it is the shared weapon of both militant
and the state in the armed conflict besides its palpable utility as a weapon. It was the political struggle for the
common goal and possession of the gun which now brought a sense of solidarity based on the bounds of
affiliation. When the narrator says that’Everyone carries gun nowadays’(72).It points how the armed conflict
enables an alteration in the traditional hierarchical structures of Kashmiri society.

Many significant events which happened in the early 1990s during the peak of the militancy are reffered to in
the novel with an aim to reinscribe and represent them because in official records they have either been
distorted or inadequately described .Notable among these events are the incident of mass –rape in poshpora, the
massacres of Gaw Kadal and sopore ,the fake encounters on the LOC,or the issue of mass graveyards.The
incident of Gaw Kadal ,the narrator speaks of nearly50 people being killed by the Central reserve police
force(CRPF) in broad daylight when the newspaper headline ‘The river of blood ‘said ‘young and old ,men
and children, dead on a bridge’.(117)Tragically, the government version given of the same incident in the text
downplays the entire event: “there was a breakdown in the law and order situation and the police were forced
to open fire on the out- of –control mob ;as a result thirty-five people were killed”(117).In one of the incident
described in the novel ,farooq Khan of Nowgam is first tortured and then brutally beheaded for being an
associate of militants. During another search operation in Nowgam ,Khadim Hussain is killed by the for
allegedly helping the militants .The mass burials of the people killed by the captain kadian’s army unit on the
LOC are closely associated with the enforced disappearances .Waheed is alluding to a recurring case in
Kashmir –issues of enforced disappearances and custodial killings. This gruesome reality is reflected in the
formation of the APDP (Association of parents of Disappeared Persons)which puts the number enforced
disappearances in Kashmir between 1989 and 2009 to be 8000- 10000 people.

In the novel the description in the media about the conflict are keenly scrutinised.The captain’s various
references to media, in his conversations with the narrator, serve to establish the dichotomy between the actual
happenings on the ground and the reportage in media.The language of propaganda in the media about the
conflict subtly satirized. The narrator’s father dismisses Doordarshan news India’s national broadcasting
agency, as “all lies ,sarasar bakwas, and utter nonsense (112).Whenever the army clashes with militants,many
deaths result, and the narrator describes how such episodes are trivialized as ‘an encounter ‘or a ;
skirmish”(5).Almost as if nothing has happened. There is also the description of fake encounter which are
usually staged –managed and reported through media partisanship or indifference. When some journalists
come from dehli to cover the situation on the border,captainKadian brags about the skills of stage –managing
the operations when he tells narrator: I can make any moderchod look like an Afghan. The dead don’t
speak,remember,and I still have plenty of old photos and clothes”(9)The other notable scene of stage-
managing things through media occurs towards the end of the novel when the governor visits the Nowgam on
the occasion of the indain republic day. He is to address the people on whom he had ordered a crackdown.It is
the intense mountain cold of January that the old and theinfirm,theb women and the children ,had to listen his
words after having endured earlier three days of curfew incarnation. A menstruating women weeps, having
faced that incarnation,but the irony is that the media persons accompanying the governor give coverage only to
his address and his distribution of his gifts to the people.what goes totally unnoticed, and therefore remains
unreported is the fact of the people’s agony and privations during a long curfew when they were housebound.
The idealized reportage does not notice their agony under curfew.

Women in Kashmir have been the worst hit due to conflict. They are often the worst victims in any conflict
because of their vulnerable position in the society.The worst kind of violence is committed on their bodies
during violent times.the history of the unending suffering of kashmiris dates back to the year 1989,when
insurgency started in kashmirr Kashmir conflict has wrecked hovac with all people of the valley and women
folk has suffered the most.The dimensions of the conflict have been many and has been difficult, due to
research in these sensitive areas,to get holistic ideas about the problems faced by the women. Their problem
have multiplied over time.As the conflict raged on far more than twenty years ,it has left them
physically,socially,psychologically and economically distressed. They are the worst suffers of the conflict and
thus are the real victims.
In all types of conflict women have been exploited physically and in Kashmir they have met the same fate.
Many actors have been involved in sexual and physically exploitation of women.However,since these actions
are politically and socially sensitive many cases of abuses have not come to lightThe state women’s
commission have documented many abuses and NGO’s have documented even more heinous crimes against
the daughters of eve in Kashmir.

It is not that Kashmiri women have not come forward to make themselves visible in the society. They have
treaded much success. There are many Kashmiri women who have qualified prestigious national competitive
exams since the very outset of the insurgency ,kashmiri women hve been killed In cross firing ,blown up in
grenade explosions shot dead or killed in tear gas shelling .Women always feel insecure in the present
environment of the conflict.

Violence to Kashmiri women take different forms : they are bruised, beaten, tortured,
maimed,mutilated,molested, and sexually abused.Even most of them have been jailed for years.The Kunan
poshpora mass gang rape and the shopian gang rape and murder cases are undeniably the worst
examples.Psychiatric disorders have been seen mounting since insurgency with these killings .More and more
women are admitted in kashmir’s only Psychiatric Disease hospital ,Rainwari.

The Kashmir women have undergone terrible shocks ,gifted to them by the conflict.Their sons have been killed
,their children orphaned, husbands disappeared, and thus are welcomed .Very sparingly the term “Half-
Widow”is applicable only to women in Kashmir as their husbands have been subjected to’enforced
disappearance ‘ and there has been no evidence of them since their missing;thus their become ‘half –orphan’s
a term again used for Kashmiri children alone.

Sexual assault like rape, which have frequently been used as a weapon of war and tool of politaical repression.
The novel, waheed has created the character of dasrat singh ,who invariably accompanies captain kadian during
the latter’s dreaded session of interrogation .While on the look out for for militants in search operations,Dasrath
Singh ferociously kicks a pregnant woman in her belly.Consquently, this hapless woman gives birth to a baby
with fractured limbs .the captain reserves high praise for singh, whose ranking as low subordinate makes the
captain lightly dismiss the man’s brutality as a’as procedural error(265).In the Kunan Poshpora village ,mass
rape incident in Kupwara, north Kashmir,40 women were raped by the indain army’s 4th Rajputana Rifles .this
was done while holding the village men captive in a field while search operation for militants were being
carried out.Numberous national and international rights organizations have investigated and verified the
gruesome incident. The Indian government, however has denied that any such incident took place.in reflection
on this incident ,waheed narrator sarcastically remarks: ’A brand new minister for Kashmir affairs from Delhi
was also quoted as saying that no place by the name of poshpora ever existed on the map’.(26).To add the irony
of these words ,the novelist creates a group of women, hailing from poshpora ,they were looking very pathetic
and miserable and they all gathered in front of the Noor Khan’s shop most of them were weeping,crying
,screaming with hunger .They were withered and some of them were consoling .These milk beggars came as a
reason to get milk in Srinagar for feeding their young babies because they were about dying if they don’t get
milk. They only want milk and no other edible things for eating. They only want to get milk for their babies.
They insisted locale people don’t return us empty hands. Having been under curfew for more than three months,
these young mothers arrive in nowgam searching for milk to satisfy the hunger of their hungry babies. They
symbolize the state of utter desperation and helplessness of mothers who are so starved by weeks of curfew. In
the novel this oppression of women is manifested in the perpetual state of silence in which they find themselves
as their ‘stories dried up some time ago’(113).These milk beggars were vey feeble in physically and voice was
shrill. Their bosom were barren and they were unable make milk because scarcity of food. For them milk is
everything.

Waheed also traces a differential history of the armed struggle by reflecting on its underlying
contradictions.These contradictions are the role of Pakistan and the act of oppression committed by the
militants while they claim to be the liberators of their oppressed people. The role Pakistan in fomenting the
armed struggle against india cannot be denied;it aims to engage india by means of a proxy war.If the novel is
blunt and scathing in portraying the brutality of the Indian state, it also takes the critical and sarcastic view of
Pakistan and the militants. Pakistan is described as ‘that goddamn country a few kilometers across the border
which is never at rest and will never let anyone else rest in peace either’(152).It is described as the place from
were the militants come with arms training to fight against Indian authority in Kashmir. Pakistan is said to view
kashmir as a conflict that can be resolved only through the prism of jihad and securing territory from
IndiaWaheed’s novel foregrounds the contradictions within the armed struggle. This offers multiple
perspectives which serve both to contest the dominant versions of mainstream writings and also to give voice
to the people who have long been deprived of the right to speak for themselves.Militants claimed to be the
liberators of the people are shown to be engaged in brutalities themselves .This earns them the ire and derision
of many Kashmiri, one of whom is the .narrator’s father who often condemnsthem for their violent methods.In
one such istance ,when reman khan narrates the brutality of the militants, the narrator’s father indulges in a
tirade against militants, who according to him,are bereft of any”religion “and whom he regards as a “ slur on
islam”as they have no principles208)

In the novel,kashmir militants groups are denounced fot their role in the atrocities. An example .is the narrator’s
description of the tongue of shaban khatana’s wife being cut out and her son, Raman’s arm being disfigured
because both are seen to have berayed trhe cause of the movement for azadi as well as the militants.Intrestingly
reman is shown as a former guide who used to scot for recruits to whisk across the loc into Pakistan .Militants
in the novelare shown issuing threats to those who are seen as betraying the cause.A real life incident,like the
kidnapping of Rubaiyya Saeed, the daughter of a prominent politician in kashmir,is also reffered to in the
novel.Extremist militant group,seeking to enforce an Islamic code of behavior,launched violent attacks on
women. In an oblique reference ,the narrator once says:

Chapter2

Curfewed Night starting with haunting cover picture, the picture is for a girl looking through the fence at a
funeral as a body of a boy is taken away.Curfewed Night is a candid account of life in Kashmir, the peace and
calm of before 90s and fear and harrow of after 90s.This novel is a harrowing read and it is a story not to be
forgetting. As Khushwant Singh says,“Beautifully written, brutally honest and deeply hurtful”. And another
writer Ahmad Rashid, ”The story of Kashmir has never been told before so evocatively and profoundly .peer
writes with skill of a novelist, the insight of a journalist, and the evocative power of a poet.”.Pankaj Mishra
says about this novel, “Challenges our most cherished beliefs…everyone should read it”. “A passionate and
important book-a brave and brilliant report from a conflict the world has chosen to ignore.”salman Rushdie.
Curfewed Night is packed with facts and emotions. Its subject matter is most apt and appropriate.The novel
describes what the heaven it kashmir was and what a hell it is now.It is emotional tale of man “love for his land
, the pain of leaving home and ultimately the joy of return. Curfewed Night is the memoir of young Kashmiri
journalist Basharat peer, recounting his youth in a drown-trodden valley of kashmir during the 80s and 90s .The
narrator tells his own childhood story with his own brother Wajahat.How they made homemade ice creams and
snowmen . They were playing on frozen snow and slide down the slope of the hill, and they were always
rebukd or beaten by the grandfather , the school master.Our Grandfather ,always expressed his preference of
textbooks over cricket.And always told them “ You good for nothing”.By his familiar bark the cricket players
would scatter in all directions and disappear.Everyone was busy in his own work in a peaceful climate ( means
peaceful kashmir).There was no murder, no crime, no agitation,no bondage, no mass rapes like Kunan poshpora
and Shopian.Everyone was feeling ease and comfort, there was no place of inconvenience, there was no
showing of identity cards, no crackdowns and parade. Everything was working smoothly and peacefully. In
those days the greatest fear was , untimely rain ,as it could spoil the crops.If they saw steaks of scarlet in the
sky, they said,”There has been a murder somewhere.When a man is killed, the sky turns red”(3).Murder was
surprise for Kashmiri people.Curfewed Night ii a brave and unforgettable piece of literary reporting that reveals
the personal stories behindone of the most brutal conflict in modern times.curfewed Night is nothing if not
personal.Born and raised in war-torn region, basharat peer brings this little unknown part of the world to life in
haunting vivid detail.He was born in kashmoi in 1977.He studied political science at Aligarh muslim university
and journalismat Columbia university.He has worked as a reporter at redcliff and tehelka and has written for
various publications including the guardian,financial times,new statesman and foreign affairs where he was
assistant editor.He is currently based in New york.Peer’s book is lyrical,intensely partisan and cynical in varied
proportions.Most Indians think they have a fair understanding of the conflict in kashmir .Peer’s excellent book
makes the reader realize how little we know about what is going on in one of the most beautiful states in our
country.The amount of research put in by the author basharat peer has added the crucial element of authenticity
and authority.Peer’s writing takes the reader on a journey that not many outside kashmir have been though.

But the misery started in 1989,when the Indian army started counter-insugency.It tore Kashmir into parts over
the last 30 years. We have sense of alienation towards Indian rule. We did not relate to the symbols of indian
nationalism-the flag, the national anthem, the cricket team. We followed every cricket match India and Pakistan
played but we never cheered for the Indian team. If India played by the England, we supported England

The novel is fed up with themes, but the main themes are: Insurgency, Armed conflict, custodial
killings,oppression,gun-culture, and kashmiriyat.

Kashmir was the largest of the approximately five hundred princely states under British raj as of 1947.It was
predominantly Muslim but ruled by a Hindu maharaja, Hari Singh.

Chapter 3 “The greatest sufferings bring the greatest hopes, the greatest miseries greatest patience, and the
greatest uncertainties lead to the greatest quests” (1). History witnesses the ambivalence have always affected
and individual, both physically and mentally. Kashmir’s suffered, strived and struggled but there doesn’t seem
any end to their miseries. The ongoing conflict had made ther living even worse than hell.Shahnaz Bashir has
made good attempt to address the psychological condition of the people, based on his own experience and
memories. Physical injuries are visible to everyone but mental psyche often go unacknowledged.Haleema lost
her son in the ongoing conflict and despite the trauma and agony of being a mother; she made every effort to
search out her lost son, till her last breath.This chapter will look the sensitive human nature of novel and the
mental agony through which the protagonist went through.

Contemporary literary scenario of Kashmir brings the tragedy and angst of the people living there.Previously
writers from outside the valley,like Mulkraj Anand and Salman Rushdie used to depict the discourse of the
valley.But now there is an advent of many indigenious voices like Basharat Peer,Mirza Waheed,Rahul Pandita
and Shahnaz Bashir.As experienced by themselves these writers are successful in portraying the dynamic
shades of the ongoing conflict. They have spotlight the intricate subjects like individuality, exertion,
travails,endeavor and persecution which were normally missing from the main stream narrative thought of
Kashmir.In earlier times literature of Kashmir was mostly written in Urdu and Kashmiri, but writing in English
had put the Kashmiri literature on the global track.

In The Half Mother, his debut novel, Shahnaz Bashir has attempted to address the issue of involuntary
disappearances in Kashmir,which has been engulfed by the violent since the late 1990s,The 182-page book
focuses on the courages Haleema , a mother, a daughter and a woman full of hope and the energy to fight
against her suffering.Shahnaz Bashir,in his debut novel The half Mother,brings to us a tale of ordinary civilians
undr attack, in a war they neither want, nor support, and the tenacious struggle of a lone women for her right to
dignity and life.Haleema, seprated from her husband after just a few months of matrimony, lives with her aging
father Ghulam Rasool joo, whom she calls Ab jaan, and her teenage son,Imran.They are simple people, who
have nothing to do with the unrest breaking out around them. There are,of course, the boys next door who have
grown up with Imran,who cross the border to join the insurgents. The inurgency in Kashmir , is a conflict
between various Kashmiri separastists and government of india .Few groups favour Kashmiri accession to
Pakistan, while others seek kashmir’s complete independence.The conflict in Kashmir has the strong islamist
elements amoung the insurgents.The roots of the conflict between the Kashmiri insurgents and the indian
government are tied to dispute over local autonomy.This insurgency was changed into armed insurgency .In
july 1988,aseries of demonstrations, strikes and attacks on the indian government began the Kashmir
insurgency, which during the 1990s escalated into the most important internal security issue in india.

Thousands of people have died during fighting between insugents and the government as well as thousands of
civilians who have died as a result of being targeted by the various armed groups.The inter .service intelligence
of Pakistan has accused by india supporting and training mujahedeento fight in Kashmir.By this insurgency and
according to official figure released , there were 3400 disappearance cases and the conflict has left more
than47000 people dead which also includes 7000 police personnel as of july 2009.And after that its increase
mounting.

However, the number of insurgency-related deaths in the state have fallen sharply since the start of a slow-
moving peace process between india and Pakistan.Begining in 2004, Pakistan began to end its support for
insurgents in Kashmir.This happened because terrorist groups linked to twice tried to assassinate Pakistani
president General parvez Musharaf.The present situation of Kashmir insurgency is , according to the Reuters
only few people is joining now in insurgency.

When counter-insurgency started in Kashmir valley, because of above reasons in late 1980s, indian troops
enterd in Kashmir valley to control the insurgency.
Haleema’s son Imran was not insurgent,he was not joined any organization and any groups.He was innocent
,but he was slain by the hands of indian troops.When the military men come to their gates,searching for hidden
insurgents.Ab jaan’s becomes the first death in the neighbor hood of natipora, a portent of times to come .One
day, Imran is picked up by the army on a flimsy excuse, and just disappears, beginning a nightmare for
Haleema, of days of searching all avenues for son dovetailing into each other.

Though the language sounds heavy and clunky in parts( suggestive of translation from thought processes in the
writer’s native language, Kashmiri words and verses used in many places),the narrative is captivating enough
with details of real places and incidents- fictionalized for the story,to hold the reader’s attention.

The arrogance of the army officers, the dread in the minds of the ordinary people,the horror of the torture
camps. The helpleeness, yet single mindedness of a mother searching for her innocent son, the nurturing of hope
against all odds. The not knowing of a loved one’s fate was the most wrenching thing-Hence ‘half mother’: the
term widow’ had been coined persons, for the wife of a man missing ,yet not known if dead or alive.

Introduction

Jammu and Kashmir is one of the crowns of Asia. It is often termed as “the paradise on earth”.A
beautiful mountain states with clear rivers, evergreen forests and one of the highest death rates in the
world. It is at center of an old-aged dispute between Pakistan and India that has dragged on from the
independence of both nations over fifty years ago to the present time, with no resolution in sight. The
combined population of the two nation totals over a billion ,so no conflict between them is of passing
importance, especially when nuclear weapons are involved. Pakistan and India share a common
heritage, language, and tradition, yet the subject of Kashmir can push them to the brink of annihilation.
Fifty years of animosity have built up as a result. A proxy war still brews in Kashmir, claiming dozens of
lives every day,running up a causality total over time into the hundred thousand. Kashmir have suffered
untold horrors and Kashmir has the notorious reputation of being one of the world’s most dangerous
flashpoints. Pakistan and India both believe they have valid claims of Kashmir. Pakistan and its leaders
have referred to Kashmir as the “jugular vein” of Pakistan.A fact reported on the Indian embassy’s note
on Kashmir.This refers to the major river originating in the Kashmir valley on which Pakistan critically
dependent.India claims to Kashmir as “integral part of india”.In July 6, 1951. Jawaharlal Nehru said,
“people seem to forget that Kashmir is not a commodity for sale or to be bartered. It has an individual
existence and its people must be the final arbiters of their future”. If we start the recounting the
history,where the roots of the conflict lie.We must go through the history of India , as India is massive
nation made up of several states, ruled by the british.A long and difficult struggle culminated with the
british choosing to leave india in August 1947.The muslims of the land decided that instead of just a free
india,they would create a free Pakistan for themselves as well.

Today Kashmir refers to a larger area that includes the indian-administered regions of Kashmir
valley,jammu and ladakh, the Pakistani administered regions northern areas and Azad Kashmiri, and
the chinse administered region of aksai chin.At present, jammu and Kashmir state came into being as a
single political and geographical entity following the Treaty of Amritsar following between the british
government and Gulan singh signed on ,march 16,1846.The treaty handed over the control of the
Kashmir state to the dogra rular of jammu who had earlier annexed ladakh. Now the new state
comprising three district regions of jammu, Kashmir and ladakh was formed by Maharaja Gulab singh
as its founder ruler.Kashmir was originally an important centre of hindusim and later of Buddhism. Half
way through the 14th century ad, shah mirza became the first muslim ruler of Kashmir and started the
line salatin-i- Kashmir. For the next five centuries Kashmir had muslim rulers, which included satan
zain- ul-abidin (budshah), who became the ruler in 1420, the Mughals, whose rule lasted until 1751, and
the Afghan Durranis, who ruled Kashmir from 1752 until 1820. That year, the Sikhs under Rangit Singh,
annexed Kashmir, and held it untill 1846.

The upsurge of militancy and political movements has impacted the economy of the state greatly.The
crown of india as it is popularly known for its beauty and the geographical location with respect to the
country’s other states has been a victim of terrorism.

All sectors of the economy, which agriculture is the pre-dominant have been affected by the frequent
turbulences and failed to provide food and life security to the population of the valley.Tourism revenue
has been lost to extent of billions of dollars owing to dormant industry and large scale displacement of
pandits, Sikhs and muslims due to frequent riots have resulted in enormous sufferings of human
resources. Significant migration from the valley moved other parts of the country in search of beeter job
and work opportunites. As tourism industry was given a special status as it was a means to livehood to
many and also source of revenue for the government.

The decades of turmoil also hampered the peace and stability even which was not possible to achieve
without meeting the basic needs of people in the absence of economic growth. The state is still far behind
other states in economic growth at national level.Huge impact on public and private properties resulted
from conflicts and insurgenies that prevailed. The hopes must be kept high that no dismal years of
economic, political, social and developmentat stagnation revists the valley to set backl the clock for the
progressive people and prospering state of Kashmir.If peace prevails, much of what has been lostcan be
regained and revived. Jammu an d Kashmir, india’s one of the most picturesque state lies on the peaks of
Himalayan Ranges and Pir Panjal ranges,with varying topography and culture.Kashmir falls in the
northwestern region of the indian subcontinent.

Kashmiri’s young rebel poets and writers who are breaking barriers, challenging stereotypes and busting
many a myth by writing about womanhood, violence , resistance , resilience, and romance. They also
write about bullets and blood, pellets and blindness, militarization, custodial disappearances, mass
graves, rapes, eve teasing etc. On most things under the sun. Even the sun itself.These writers have
endeavoured to raise voices and write narratives of mourning and suffering of Kashmiri opeople and ask
questioning the indian occupation in Kashmir.Their narrative offer authoritative accounts of the
Kashmiri victims who have faced brutal mutilation at the hands of indian security forces in a tumultuous
and blistering atmosphere.The narratives also demonstrate chronicles of an ending and offensive abuse of
human rights in Kashmir.These Kashmiri writers put the Kashmiri literature in global focus and have
shown the world that Kashmir is the synonym ous in the blood shed, oppression, violence and
depravation.Shahnaz Baashir has emerged a shining star in the literay anon of Kashmiri fiction I
English.He wont he Muse India Young Writers Award 2015for his debut novel The Half Mother.
Scattered Souls, his second book is a collection of thirteen short stories mostly set in 1990s’s. Both
Kashmiri men and women have suffered endlessly fron the massive and devasting conflict and Bashir in
hais collection has succeefully and aptly turned these men and women into life- sized charactyers in the
book scattered souls.In this book Shahnaz Bashir has portrayed many pathetic characters , who suffered
with the advent of insurgency and enforced dis appearances.

Sahanaz Bashir has made ues of a simple narrative and has let a very literal streak of the truth pervade
thought the book and literally painted the mornfukl condition of kashmir’’s through the characters in the
collection of heart- rendering stories.the book depicts how the unending conflicy made life of people in
the 1990s miserable and suffaocated with curfew and encounters.Things like powerlessness, moral crises,
depravity and doubt are recurring motifs almost in every story.The book describes how the bitter
conflict, draconian laws and huge militarization have wreaked havoc in the lives of ordinary Kashmiri
people.The first story “Transistor” delineates how ignorant people in Daddgaam village paid heed to
rumors which claimed the death at the hands of militants, of innocent Mohammad Yousaf Dar,Who was
loyal and great supporter of revolution and insurgency.When bullets pumped into him,his great
memories flashed through his mindHe remembers all his faithfulness and obedience of the conflict.He
remembers thundering out word Azaadi… smoking cigrattes and cracking jokes with insurgents…
marching beside them in processions….hiding the during crackdowns…helping them transport their
weapons under his pheran…risking himself by shielding them during army raids on the village.But
instead of that, he was killed by insurgents as a rumor as his walkie-talkie “to spy on the freedom
movement in the village”.Insurgency is a curse of Kashmiri people which is running through generation
to generation and increase the death rates day- by- day.He was listening BBc radio instead of
government news because he did not thrust the government reports on the conflict of Kashmir,it was his
displeasure and resistance.In those days there was chaos and confusion prevailing in the Kashmir. In
1990s army descended upon Kashmir to quell a massive armed rebellion against indian rule. They
entered not just the land, but also the lives of its people, fracturing their idea of home and punctuating
their days and nights with curfews.These stories tell us Indian government and insurgency destroy the
lives of Kashmiri people.

When a pen in hand, they are rewriting kashmir’s literary history with creativity, courage and
conviction.Some writers write their mother tongue ,Kashmiri, and urdu.These writings are about
resistance, conflict,rebellion, romance, feminism and existentialism. Pain too, and innovative.As shahnaz
Bashir’s The half Mother , mainly focused on burning issue of custodial disappearances of kashmir’s
youth since the eruption of the popular armed struggle in 1989.Kashmiri youth are living in draconian
laws, blistering atmosphere,hustle and bustle circumstances and heart- wrenching situations.Everyday is
day of deaths. What happens in Kashmir nobody knows.the main unpleasant and hedious law is Armed
Forces Special Powers Act,for this Kashmir have been agitating of its withdrawal. It gives the army
impunity to cross the barrier of laws and conventions into violations of human rights.By this draconia
law Kashmiri people have suffered lot, this raised the figure of enforced disappearance in mounting.

Human rights organisations have repeatedly criticized the cultureof forced disappearances in Kashmir,
mainting that a majority of those killed were targeted in “fake encounters”.

Stories of disappearances, encounters, death and violence characterizes every day life in kashmir. Here
are personal accounts from Kashmir.

A 13 year old youth, He had gone to the neighbouring village to see a profreedom demonstration when
indian forces opened fire to break peaceful protests.Later his brother receivd a phone call from the
hospital informing him that he was wounded. A moment later his brother received another phone call,
this time to tell us that he had been killed. The doctors said that his brother was dragged from the bed
and shot twice the neck and back by the military inside tha hospital.There are other pathetic and
melancholy stories too.Which are very unusual and hard to hear and bear.Clampdown, is a familiar
word in the valley with curfew routine in Kashmiri lives.Protests, firing, ,arrests snapping of mobile and
internet services.The new generation remain alienated, with frustration and anger now defining
emotions.

In the “Gravestone”,the author skillfully describes how an individual relinquishes his self respect to the
enormous pressures of economic and psychological needs.Mohammad Sultan, a talented carpenter and
persistent adherent of freedom struggle had to finally his self respect and apply for a monetary
compensation for his martyred son, Mustaq Ahmad Najar to bring the medicines for his ailing
pneumonia affected granddaughter.The third story”The Ex-militant” lays bare the problems of injustices
, torture and viciousness to which the surrendered militants were pushed even after leaving the path of
violence and militancy. The author vividly depicts the physical, social and psychological predicament of
Ghulam Mohiuddeen, an ex- militant and the effect of his past on his present life,”Psychosis”
demonstrates author’s admirable attempt to address the psychological and traumatic condition of
sakeena, who after the mysterious disappearance of her husband, is told to offer an amount of one lack
rupee and even herself in bed by the police forces if she needs to know about her disappeared husband’s
whereabouts.Later she gang raped by the indian troops which results in the deterioration of her mental
health, ending up in her getting admitted to the government ‘Psychiatric Diseases’ Hospital,where she is
nicely treated by Dr. Imtayaz.The story “Theft” outlines Insha’s ( Ghulam Mohi-u-deen’s and Sakeena’s
daughter) struggle to find herself a place in the society where she faces humiliation and is exposed to
certain dirty jobs and accused of stealing in a cosmetics shop where she was working as a sales girl, thus
demonstrating the degrading effect of turmoil on the children of those everinvolved in militancy. The
story “ A Photo with Barack Obama” relevantly focuses on the silence of influential countries especially
America on the Kashmir issue.This is exemplified by Obama’s visit to india during which he discusses
everything ( Indian leadership, economy, heritage in his speech in his speech in the indian parliament)
but desists from mentioning Kashmir.The story also depicts sakeena’s agony and anguish towards her
son,Bilal born of rape by the indian army and how he is kicked and thrashed by the policemen and often
called “haramuk” by people and shoaib Akther for being a famous stone pelter in Batamaloo by other
stone pelters.”Oil and Roses” demonstrates how Gul Bhagwaan, the gardner was yearning for personal
contentment after the death of his adopted son who was killed spontaneously by the army men when a
tyre suddenly blasted.It shows the touching reply of Gul to the American lady that in Kashmiri people
have roses but not oil and all they want is only a bit of attention.” Country Capital” is a satirical story
which proves the ignorance and credulity of rural school children who even do not know the name of the
capital of the place they live in and only know the names of india, Pakistan and America due to the
conflict and also describes the involvement of the sarpanche and other collaborators joining hands with
army for their petty personal gains. The story “Shabaan Kaak’s Death” portrays the bitter reality of
how even the burial of the deadf becomes problematic in cuwfew striken valley and the innumerable
problems which the family, relatives and neighbours have to face the in such a situation.Shaban Kaak, an
eminent person in Hawal had dreamt of a grand burial for himself and expected some ten thousand
mourners in his funeral proceesion but actually only twenty two men could attend his funeral that too in
the absence in the professional gravedigger.” The House” an unchangeable reality substantiating how
conflicts in conflict zone areas are responsible for fracturing firmly constructed homes and unbreakable
relations and bonds.It exibits what havoc befell Farooq Ahmad Mir after his wife Zareena was killed in
the indiscriminate firing by the security forces and himself got injured when the two militants escaped
through their compound to disappear in the dense neighbourhood after attacking an army patrol.In “
Some Small Things I Couldn’t Tell you”, an ailing father writes a letter to his son advising which things
he should take recourse to and which ones to despise and confess to him that he broke all his toys gifted
to him by his maternal DSP uncle out of evil love.” The Silent Bullet” is penetrating story of Mohammad
Ameen, a philosopher and teacher who dreams of Heaven where his conscious mind makes him question
many things. Army in Natipora after kidnapping two young boys fired aerial shots to disperse the huge
crowd which got assembled there and shockingly a silent bullet pierced and sank into the back of the
teacher touching his spine. The last story” The Woman Who Became Her Own Husband” is a heart
touching story of a loving ideal couple Ayesha and Tariq Zargar in which their ecstasy is shattered when
Tariq gets ruthlessly killed in the Army firing.The author portrays the psychological condition of Ayesha
who loses her mental balance and ends up copying her husband’s activities and routine after his death,
thus becoming her own husband.

One of the defining features of the book is that all the thirteen stories are interrelated.Most of the
characters recur in the book and only their significance changes as they are related to each other one way
or other. The reader gets curious regarding the stories till the very end.The book possess such coherence
that one feels as if one is reading a novel of interconnected stories which reveal Bashir a very skilled
storyteller.