Not long ago, I sat down with my 95-year-old mother, a living witness to the history of Kashmir since the days of Maharaja’s rule. I showed her old, iconic photographs of Lal Chowk, Amira Kadal and Hari Singh High Street— images frozen in time, where volunteers at the time of partition once stood resolute, vowing to defend Kashmir and safeguard its people from raiders.
She examined the pictures closely, recalling about the surrounding grand old buildings in the background, the Kashmir talkies, where she had watched films, some nearby hotel buildings, where she remembers having tea with local cakes and breads and the lush, clean street of Lal Chowk with well-maintained pedestrian footpath followed by huge treeline in Pratap Park that started where today Ghanta Ghar is located.
She had walked through the area in her youth and remembers every inch of it along with the historical incidents that Lal Chowk has witnessed. She remembered the hurriedly made dais for Nehru and Sheikh to address the audience in Lal Chowk, where even women were seen at the forefront, vowing to defend Kashmir from any external attack post-1947. Then, with an innocence that cut deep, she asked, “Are these buildings and parks still standing?”
