Ehsaas-e-Kashmir – “A Gestalt”

Hundreds of people thronged the streets in protest, and one is quite assured that it must have reached the deaf in Shalimar Bagh, and the tunes of Zubin could not create the aura; it was a shame to music, where the resentment and oppression in the people was too evident, the reverberations were damped too, in the atmosphere of the sorrowful Kashmir.

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What was depicted to the world as an idyllic cultural tryst, the upshot of which has (just politically motivated) to be, so to say, a “Neo-bloom Kashmir”, turned out to be justpomp and show. Amidst the natural scenic beauty, the sunset fraught with serenity, the nature surfacing at times with unruly reminiscences of the past, there was a subdued silence of intense grief hung over the tureen of Kashmir’s present.

From cultural impetus to political pumping, from motivated social diminution to eradicating traditionalreligious beliefs, one thing has remained steadfast in the history and present of Kashmir, that is, the loss of youth, the rampage and oppression and white-collared terrorism unleashed on the people who just demand one thing – “Freedom to just live peacefully”.

Meanwhile, one such coherent chemistry between the not-so-peaceful life of Kashmiris and red tape factotum, which makes every pursuit to disturb the multilateral living on socio–economic and religious fronts, and act as a conduit for political gains, was one such tangential event, the concert of Zubin Mehta – Ehsaas e Kashmir. A so-called Beethoven of the East, the Indian born conductor/musician has great credentials, which gladly mark the ‘injustice’ and its propagation through politics, tradition, culture, religious poisoning and vendettas carried out via oppression, afflicted with miserable conditions, whose etiology is nothing but blood lust. The one most worthy of mentionis the ‘Special Prize of Recognition’ for unique devotion to Israel in the year 1991. In the year 2005, he was awarded as the 117th greatest Israeli of all times, and in the year 2006, he was known to have won with great hardship, the Kennedy center honors for hislifetime contribution to American culture, besides some felicitations from India.

The event made some things quite candid. Despite the threats and the general aura of dissent, the concert took place. The audience were the elite, top brass politicians, businessmen and bureaucrats who get sadistic pleasure while dominating, sabotaging and exercising imperialism on the weak and the victimized. Kashmir, since the last 20 years, has been a witnessto it, and has lost its youth and human resources for a mere claim to what has been unrightfully denied to it as abirthright.

This was a political stunt, pulled out to tell the world to ‘grow up’ andnot lament on what Kashmir has gone through. Suddenly, the concert was termed as most important for the growth of Kashmir, crucial for normalizing the situation. Consider it as a bohemian waywardness, short-sighted politics which seeks to marginalize the political crimes committed against the population of the state. The page 3 cultured  were seen applauding the music and vigorously taking in the feel. Itis ironically sad, that they never feel the same enthusiasm or the vigor, or in the least case, attend, when the meeting of parents of disappeared persons takes place, never they show an effort to relocate the disappeared, admit the custodial deaths or identify the forlorn graves. Ahmed Zameer, a university student, with a sad, depressing smile, says, “I have nothing to say, the audience were not humans but donkeys who are oblivious to the pain of common man”.
The concert was condemned among the general masses too. “Never does the empathy, at least for humanity’s sake, befall their heart (the elites), to identify the pain when a 7 year old kid dies in a fake encounter, or 15 year old teen is gunned down for merely defying the curfew to attend the tuitions. I wonder how such dead hearts feel the resonance of music!”, says deeply disturbed Syed Sami, a young entrepreneur from Kashmir.

Meanwhile, the Islamists want to rake the system for good, and bring in peace for the people long denied to them, andthe passion flares, for the religious sentiments of the majority are always hurt by the intentional political provoking, as recently seen in Ramban, Kishtwaras well as in the past.

Zubin has been identified with Israel, the country which is the real reason of imbalance in the world. “The Zionist agenda and practicing injustice are always its (Israel)hallmark, and it is a war-mongering nation which feasts on the misery of others, particularly Muslims whom they have mortal fear of, due to their strong ideology and unflinching faith in Allah. How could he be welcomed in Kashmir, where the heartbeat of the valley is in unison with theUmmah? Where the pain of Palestine,thebloodbath of Syria, the struggle of Egypt and the martyrdom of our own youth is felt raw in every heart with each passing day, becoming an infinitesimal force to drive our passion for Khilafat, the ultimate solution,” says AzharFarooqi, who works for several humanitarian organizations and international NGO’s.