Songbirds, Mystics and Our Beliefs
Songbirds and Mystics Long queues gathered outside the door of a top Faqir in our neighbourhood That pretty little bird Kettijj (swallows) excited me the most. I loved chasing the bird in wee morning hours as it flew like a fighter plane on the deserted streets – gliding and soaring – then perching on the eaves for a song. I loved watching the bird dipping dextrously a straw or a twig in a muddy puddle and like … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take, Kashmir-Talk
Gandhi In Kashmir Narrative- My Take on Ramachandra Guha Biography Of Gandhi
PUNCHLINE ‘Mahatma Gandhi’ In Kashmir Narrative By Z.G. Muhammad Couple of weeks back another voluminous biography was added to grand list of biographies on Mahatma Gandhi. Seventy years after the British sailed across the Indian Ocean the stories of the two protagonists of the India’s independence movement Mahatma Gandhi and Quaid Azam Jinnah continue to engage scholars and biographers. Notwithstanding, the two charismatic leaders of the subcontinent largely forgotten by their respective nations and reduced to emblematic … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take, Point of view
Brides and Bridegrooms Then And Now
Bridegrooms And Barber’s Bowl ZGM In our sprawling city, with beauty salons galore, and brides queuing outsides these for having long sittings with the beauticians, the stories of the past, not that past by their mothers and grandmothers when these parlors were not there, and brides still looked prettier than spring flowers sound to them as good as fairy tales. In their pursuit of looking prettier than the Helen of Troy that ‘had launched a thousand ships’ many … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take, Kashmir-Talk
Amaranth Yatra Of My Childhood
Merriments of Gusain Jaloos And we the children enjoyed the sight Nostalgia by ZGM Childhood is bliss; full of innocence, naivety and fun. In our childhood, our mothers and grandmothers were as blessed as children. I strongly believe they were as innocent and naïve as children. They, in fact, were more gullible than children and could be tricked by anyone. Those days’ mendicants from city, suburbs, and rural areas and outside state would often visit houses in our locality. Some in wee hours and some during the day and some would knock at the door at dusk. Many mendicants donned in saffron loincloth, with sticks in hand and black wooden bowl slinging on their chests would arrive in the city in mid-July. In wee hours they would enter homes. Some of them with huge … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take
Kashmir: No Procrastination Take the Bull By The Horns
PUNCHLINE Honor The International Concerns By Z.G. Muhammad There is rarely a good word about the United Nations in Jammu and Kashmir. Talk to any citizen; a toiling labourer in the street, an activist of civil resistance, an academic on the campus, a caged leader, or an armchair administrator, there is a stock complaint against the organization that it has failed to live up to its charter- that unequivocally talks of principle of equal rights and self-determination. Even … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take
Snuff Money – a facet of our culture history
Nostalgia ‘Snuff Money’ ZGM Stories of our childhood, when shared with grandchildren sound to them as fairy-tales. Many of them like the festivities that accompanied marriages with a bridegrooms on horsebacks and brides in palanquins – a wheel-less vehicle carried on shoulders by humans and a platoon of kerosene-light torchbearers read to them as tales from the Arabian Nights. Stories about some of my classmates, school dropouts, who dropped in class four, like Khaliq with charcoaled … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take
The New Power Game And Kashmir Resolution
Kashmir in New Power Game By Z.G. Muhammad Once again India-Pakistan relations are getting enmeshed in the emergent ‘neo-cold war between Washington and Moscow. Since Donald John Trump took over as President of the United States, it has become more than obvious. The two countries are apparently yet to learn lesson from the past- that it was they joining the cold war politics, which immensely contributed to the non-resolution of the disputes between and perpetuation in … Read entire article »
Filed under: Editor's Take, Kashmir-Talk