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Rasheeda Bhagat

SHE came to the Kashmir Valley as a young bride in 1947 from Lahore. "Both of us were doctors; he was a Kashmiri Pundit and I was a Punjabi... and ours was an arranged marriage. But after having lived in Srinagar for 57 years I consider myself a Kashmiri Pundit," says 80-year old Dr Jagat Mohini, director of the Rattanrani Memorial Hospital, which is as old as her years in Kashmir.

The hospital functions from an old building, where she also runs a nurses training school. In a chat with Business Line, the gynaecologist looked back wistfully at her "long and happy years in Kashmir, where I have got as much love from the Muslims as from the Hindus."

Her husband died in 1988. The turmoil began in 1989 and even though many Pundits fled the Valley, she did not feel she should leave. "On the contrary I felt I should stay back. This was my home, and I was as much a Kashmiri as anybody. So why should I leave, I asked myself."

Dr Mohini, who considers herself a Kashmiri Pundit ("My husband was one and my son, who has been living in Delhi for 27 years, is a Pundit, and I don't feel different from them"), says the thought of leaving Kashmir never occurred to her "Because the Muslims of this place have given me so much love and affection; when I came in they would call me koori, which means daughter... and later bahenji."

But after militancy started in the Valley and the Pundits fled, fearing for their lives, did she ever feel frightened or threatened?

"No," she says quietly. "I did not feel frightened. For two whole years I thought why are the Pundits running away. My son was also anxious but I didn't feel frightened because I knew all the militant boys... many of them were delivered by me."

But did she not feel sad to see these `boys' picking up the gun?

"I did feel sad. But, then, Kashmir is a place where, for centuries or generations, we have been slaves. When I say "we", I include myself. Sine 1947 the governments of Kashmir, along with the defective policies of the Centre, have ruined this place.

"When I came here, I would tell my husband: Why are the Kashmiris such cowards? Why do they put up with all this nonsense and not take any action? They do not even feel they are being deprived of so much.

"He told me that, as in English you say that discretion is the better part of valour, in Kashmiri we say that agar tum lad nahi sakey, tau kya bhag bhi nahi sakey. (If you couldn't fight, couldn't you at least run away?) That is the true Kashmiri!"

Her husband would patiently explain to her that Kashmiris couldn't be expected to behave differently because "we have been slaves for generations. But as a Punjabi, I found it very difficult to accept his explanation."

Dr Mohini says she is Indira Gandhi's cousin ("my nana and her dada were brothers") and did dabble in politics — first the Congress and then the Janata party — for a while.

When the youth of Kashmir took up the gun, she did feel "what they were doing was wrong. But successive governments in the State and New Delhi's attitude and its wrong policies on Kashmir for 55 years prove that when a nation does not care for its youth, they will rise in revolt and take the wrong path."

Finding both the J&K and Central Governments treating Kashmir "very badly, I asked Indira why don't you people listen to us? We are your own people and yet you create all the wrong policies and leave us to the tender mercies of the governments in Srinagar. She said humney yeh kiya, woh kiya (we did this and that), so I wrote to her that since you travel in aircraft, you cannot see the snakes and scorpions crawling on the ground. She was offended but I was speaking the truth."

Dr Mohini thinks that perhaps it was her Punjabi blood that made her feel "happy that the Kashmiri boys, who could not even kill a chicken, finally became brave enough to pick up the gun."

As a doctor who was, and continues to be, revered in Srinagar, she always kept her communication channels "open with the boys; I would pull their ears when they did wrong. I found some were full of faith that they were doing the right thing. Others just got entangled into militancy and could not get out."

Dr Mohini feels that the Pundits should not have left the Valley: "I told them, don't go. We can remain here as the inert minority. Why should we run away? It is our own land. But en masse they fled."

Though she has never regretted her decision to stay behind, she does not agree with the separatists' view that the insurgency in J&K was "the struggle of a freedom movement. Had it been that, I would have gladly joined them. But they were lured into militancy by Pakistan, and Pakistan trapped them by giving them money. When you have so much poverty and no employment, what will happen?"

This doctor has treated many militants with bullet injuries. "In fact, one boy, who was delivered by me, died here of a bullet injury."

On whether she was harassed by either the army or the J&K police for treating injured militants, Dr Mohini snaps, "Not at all. Is it written in our Constitution that you cannot treat people with bullet injuries? I tell them clearly: `They are here as patients; once they go out, you can arrest them.'

Many people have suggested that I give information and get the boys arrested. But why should I do that? If I know he is a militant and comes with a gunshot wound, my duty as a doctor is to treat him."

She dismisses the notion that Mufti Mohammed Sayeed has brought the "healing touch" to J&K. "What healing touch? I cannot see anything. There is no electricity; the streets are dirty and full of potholes. The militants are smarter than the Mufti. Earlier, they used to fire on the streets, now they fire elsewhere. What has improved? The Afghani militants and Kashmiri militants are all here. The only change in tactics is that earlier they used guns, now they use mines and bombs. Even today they are moving around freely. When they come to your home you have to give them food and shelter and they give you Rs 500 for a night. This goes on, so what has the Mufti achieved," she asks.

She is not optimistic about a solution emerging soon on this thorny issue. "How will a solution emerge? India has swallowed half of Kashmir and Pakistan the rest. If Kashmiris want to see a better future, hamey apna character badalna hei. Hum log bik jatey hein. (We have to change our character; we get sold). Now take a militant who gets Rs 2 lakh from the other side (Pakistan). If Mr Vajpayee gives him Rs 4 lakh, he will sell himself. He will change; and the Hurriyat will do something else from the outside."

But will not the Prime Minister's announcement of one lakh jobs and a special package of Rs 1,000 crore help? Her response is a scornful laugh. "This money will go straight into the pockets of some people and will benefit only their families."

She does not see any signs of the Pundits returning. "Those who ran away from here have settled in far away places like Bangalore Mumbai, Delhi, Jaipur, and the like. In 14 years, they have found jobs, educated their children, learnt the local language and settled down. How and why will they come back?

"The problem with Kashmiri pundits is that they were never united. They were such intellectuals that nobody listened to anybody else. The trait of a Kashmiri Pundit is that if 10 people get together, they can never agree on anything or get together for a cause.

"I have been observing the Pundits' behaviour for 56 years, and I know them inside out. So if the Mufti asks them to come back and says I`ll give you a piece of land, he cannot be serious."

Reiterating that the new J&K government has done nothing for the State, Dr Mohini says: "Actually, the peace you see here has been kept by the people of J&K — the Kashmiri Muslims and Hindus. The Kashmiris are good souls and love peace. Has it ever happened ki mohalley key das log nikley aur Hindu ko loot liya? Kabhi nahi. (10 people of the street came out and looted a Hindu? Never.)

However, a Bangalore-based Kashmiri Pundit Mr Muninder Seeru, who worked in the PWD in the Valley till he had to leave it in 1983, has a different opinion on the subject: "I spent my childhood and did my schooling in the Valley, Ladakh and Jammu. I resigned in 1983 and left the State because of the brazen `anti-Pundit' sentiment. This was in 1983, much before the current militancy had taken root in 1989, when many Pundit houses were ransacked, looted and burnt and the men and women humiliated in Anantnag."

He is pained by "the people in Kashmir, including the common man on the streets of Srinagar, never bothering about the plight non-Muslim Kashmiris. They talk only about the ill treatment of Muslims in India. What about the ill treatment of Hindus in Pakistan? And what about us Pundits who have been driven away from our lands and houses?"

Mr Seeru adds that his family sold their "fully furnished house in Srinagar, that we could never visit until last year, after waiting in hope all these years and praying that we would be able to go back, stay in our homes and show the place to our children as locals and not tourists."

He says he sold his house at a third of the market price and asks if "anyone in Kashmir realises what it means to sell assets forcibly at throw-away prices. This is nothing but forced migration and partition."

Adds the anguished man, who is forced to live as a "migrant" in his own country: "When people like Mr Mohammed Sayeed talk about Kashmiryat and the `healing touch', do they ever think of people like us? Don't we also need healing?"

(Response can be sent to rasheeda@thehindu.co.in)

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