JAMMU: Kashmir, cradled in the Himalayan foothills and renowned for its iconic and picturesque beauty, has been turned into a graveyard as a result of Pakistan’s and its proxies’ unending gun violence in the Valley.
It was once a paradise on earth, but it was suffocated by the staccato of gunshots, which claimed the lives of innocent people almost every second day. In the Kashmir Valley, just graveyard breezes have blown over the years. Murderers travels the area in various disguises, posing as a gun-toting ‘well-wisher’ armed by Pakistan and speaking Jihad, Allah, and destiny all rolled into one.
The arrival of spring goes unnoticed, and the splendours of summer fail to arouse any interest. The melody of melancholy reverberates all around, more than the kooing cuckoo. Pakistan’s dirty politics, dubbed ‘Azadi,’ has pitted one Kashmiri against another, forcing them to fire weapons at each other.
The harsh reality is that Azadi, which Kashmiris enjoyed prior to the 1990s, has been taken away from them, and their lives have been enslaved by do’s and don’t death and destruction. The death dance that began in the 1990s with the arrival of the first AK 47 from the other side of the border is still going on.
Pak-sponsored terrorists use the words collaborator, mukhbir (informer), RSS henchman, and sarkari aadmi to justify their acts of violence against fellow Kashmiri brethren and get away with murder and other heinous crimes. But there is one fact that no one can deny: Pakistan is using one Kashmiri to murder another Kashmiri.
The sound of gunshots echoed in the surrounding mountains of south Kashmir’s Anantnag district last Friday, signalling the loss of another precious life and the arrival of bad news at the doorsteps of another Kashmiri family. Mohammad Saleem, a Territorial Army soldier, was the latest victim. He had gone on leave to his hometown of Jablipora in Bijbehara to spend some time with his family. Pall of gloom descended village after news of his killing reached there. Since then his parents are in a state of shock. Scores of incidents have been reported so for where the victims and assailants were local Kashmiris.