Kashmir; Eid Under Oppression

Let me tell you what Eid means when under occupation and oppression. For that matter, this crown for oppression, terror, rapes, molestations in Kashmir goes to none other than the world’s largest so called democracy – India!

A nation oppressed by occupiers knows no Eid. Kashmir knows no Eid, but it is just celebrating it as a sign of formality. How can there be an Eid for a mother who grieves her murdered child killed by the barbaric Indian occupational army while his killers still roam free? There is no Eid for the mother of Tufail Matoo and thousands other mothers who lost their sons to Indian brutality. There is no Eid for a father hugging his child, who can’t see the world and the happiness around because of the pellet fired by the Indian soldiers, which made him lose his eyesight.

Can we call that Eid when a mother wakes up on the morning of the Eid day and wonders if her son who is in coma, because of the occupiers’ bullet, will ever wake up and witness another Eid? There is no Eid for a mother struggling to raise the children of the martyr and to keep his memory alive. There is no Eid for a father who lies on his deathbed and prays, not for a recovery, but prays to be spared long enough, even for a minute, just to touch again the face of his imprisoned son, somewhere languishing in the Indian jail.

There is no Eid for a child who tries to remember the face of his/her murdered father, the smile of his/her raped mother, the laughter of his/her butchered sibling. There is no Eid for a child who waits for Eidi from his/her father who was snatched away by the Indian army.

There is no Eid for the widows, half widows and orphans, rendered so at the hands of Indian forces and due to the prolonged occupation of Kashmir by India. According to a study, conducted by Kashmir University’s Sociology department along with J&K Yateem Foundation, Kashmir has an approximate number of 2.14 lakh orphans and 32000 widows due to the prolonged occupation and the struggle against it, and the number is increasing day in and day out.

There is no Eid for a child yearning for every word, every description of the father he/she never knew, as his/her father was murdered by the Indian forces before his/her birth. How can Abdul Lateef’s new born baby celebrate Eid, who never saw her father? Abdul Lateef got killed with five other people for protesting against the desecration of Holy Quran by the Indian BSF, recently at Gool area of Ramban. There is no Eid for a revolutionary who recalls the sacrifices of those who took the path of resistance and tries keeping the flame of resistance alive until liberation.

There is no Eid for those whose dreams are shattered, whose hopes are broken and whose lives have been crushed by Indian occupation and oppression.

Kashmir spends its Eid in cemeteries, at the graves of loved ones murdered by the bullets and shells of the Indian occupation. Nations often remember the martyred sons of the soil on Independence days, but Kashmir remembers its martyrs on the festival of Eid. Instead of visiting a relative or a close neighbor on this day, a common Kashmiri is seen marching towards the Martyrs’ Graveyard with moist eyes. What a lifelong Eid gift from democratic occupiers, who on these festivities greet Kashmir a “Happy Eid”! And the Kashmiris celebrate it as a grief-stricken folk!
Their Eid is spent in the streets of every town, village and every nook and corner of Kashmir, shouting out: ‘We want our freedom!’ For freedom is their Eid.