HYDERABAD: Soon after the release of the film, Kashmir Files, social media was abuzz with memories of the dark days of the exodus. The film has brought back memories of a disturbing past which deprived people of their homes and basic rights, and scattered them across the country. CE speaks to a few Kashmiri Pandits who have made Hyderabad their home. They talk about missing their hometown and how they escaped a hopeless situation.
Bharat Bushan Dhar, a manager of business solutions at a private firm in Hyderabad, grew up in Pazi Pora village of Kupwara district. While most Pandits lived in the cities, others, who lived in the villages, were farmers, like his parents. “Hindus are a minority in Jammu and Kashmir. In September 1989, our Kashmiri Pandit leader was killed and slogans of ‘Azadi’ filled the Valley. We were terrified,” he says, as he recalls some of his unpleasant childhood memories from the conflict-ridden State.
A year later, on January 19, announcements were made from mosques, asking all of them to either convert to Islam or leave Kashmir. “This had scared the living daylights out of us. About 11 people from our village (including Bharat and his family) got into a truck and left the Valley for good. We lived as refugees in Jammu for a while; little did we know that that would be the last time we saw our home. Though the properties there are still in our name, we cannot even think of visiting again,” he says.
Neetu Raina, now a resident of Manikonda, was all of 12 when she witnessed blasts and murders in her hometown in Anantnag. She still cannot get over how things turned tragic in a matter of days. “Our village was known for its beautiful landscape — it felt like living in heaven. We did not know how it all started, but people began bullying us when Pakistan won a cricket match against India. We were teased because we are Pandits,” she says, trying hard to hold back her tears.
In 1990, her heaven turned into burning hell. They heard bombs go off at a nearby bus stand. Neetu was class VI and had no clue what was happening around her. “For months, we were trying to figure out what and why all of this was happening. It was when my uncle was murdered that things started to get to us. We had three options — escape, stay back in Anantnag and wait for our death or convert to Islam. We chose the first,” says Neetu, whose family has not been able to trace their cousin ever since.
When Neetu watched Vivek Agnihotri’s Kashmir Files, she broke down. “I always wished someone would tell our story. Vivek Agnihotri is God for us, for making this film. He has shown the truth the way it was. This is not a movie, it’s reality.”
Rahul Razdan, a product manager at an MNC in Hyderabad and the general secretary of Youth 4 Panun Kashmir, says that despite the efforts, a single film cannot document all the atrocities. “There are innumerable tragic stories that are waiting to be told from that fateful year in Kashmir. Many say that the film exaggerates certain events, but I tell you that the film has shown only a glimpse of what had happened. The torture of poet Sarvanad Premi ji was not shown, and so many other details were missing,” he says.
Rahul, who is from Srinagar, was in class VII when he was stopped from being part of a Shivaratri pooja. “My immediate family did not face death, but we lived in fear all through. Three of our families decided to leave the place. We gathered our bare minimum stuff and left our homes. We did not stop our truck until we crossed the Banihal Qazigund Road Tunnel. We did not even have the time to decide where to go, we just ended up in Jammu the next evening. We landed at our uncle’s home and all of us lived in a single room and shared a kitchen for days. People are yet to understand the gravity of the horror. It is unfortunate that people are even debating the verity of the tragedy,” he laments.
Bharat concludes that though it has been 32 years since the exodus, it was time that the government declared it a genocide and help families get back to their homes. He is grateful that a movie like Kashmir Files has started a discussion on this.
After watching Kashmir Files, Kashmiri Pandits in Hyderabad recall the dark days of the exodus which snatched from them their homes, livelihood and loved ones. Here are their brutally honest stories