Kashmiri Women being Kashmiri Women

What are Kashmiri women like in the world of revolution, chaos, wars, western and Indian imperialism? How do we navigate our paths, or do we at all? Of course we do, oh you thought because of our Muslim and Kashmiri identity we don’t navigate our paths? We don’t look for revolutions? Huh? We run revolutions, fiercely and unapologetically though there are imperialist forces such as Bollywood and the whole Western machinery that try to invisiblize Kashmiri women as ‘bichaer’ – a status of pity – but I dare you not! Yes, we are mothers, sisters, and wives, but above all, we are also Kashmiri women with no other associated identity and that in itself is wholesome. Our fierce desire for a freedom of our motherland is our primary goal in life because after all we are women, and how come we do not stand up for the truth and put “Go India Go Back” slogan in action? We are the key drivers of the revolution in Kashmir. We stand tall when the imperialist-colonialist Indian occupational forces ask us to persuade our beloved ones, who have taken up arms to fight the colonialist state, to surrender. We stand tall with our shadows tall enough to chase these hyeundustanik cowards with a louder cheer for “INDIAN DOGS GO BACK”. Oh I tell you not that sometimes I really feel bad for us using dogs in the slogan. I mean after all dogs are cute and ever so humane unlike the Indian occupational forces.

India’s International Women right day in Kashmir?

While I am writing this piece, I am wondering about what India means when it says “celebrating International Women’s Day in Kashmir ”. I cannot think of a thing but how India has used it as a colonial agenda, only to assimilate the identity of Kashmiri Muslim women under the garb of “rights”. What really do they mean by it? Oh yes, I am just thinking how they will ask Angan Wadi workers, school teachers and social welfare departments to introduce names such as “naari shakti”or how to become a taekwondo player and play under the colonialist symbol-Indian flag or how marrying an Indian is a privilege for a Kashmiri woman and how the abrogation of the Article 370 of the Indian Constitution has given rights to Kashmiri women. Not to mention that they have started humanizing Jammu and Kashmir Police, but we Kashmiris call them as Pondi police – criminals and cowards who have no self-respect and lack the humane element in them. On this International Women’s Day, the Pondi police will put advertisements through Instagram reels, Radio Kashmir and of course these FM channels where these apologetic Kashmiri RJs will host Pondi police to tell us how Kashmiri men are a threat to Kashmiri women and how Pondi police is just a call away in case any sexual harassments and other threats. But we Kashmiri women live the reality every day where the only threat in Kashmir we have is Pondi police and Indian occupational forces whether it be going to a school, university, a market or to an apple orchard to get fodder for our cattle. The presence of an Indian armed man in Kashmir in itself is a disgrace that we Kashmiri women can never be okay with.

In case the colonial masters and their yes boys and yes girls think we forget names, WE DON’T. We remember all those names of the occupational forces such as Rohit Shukla who during the raids sexually assaulted women in Pulwama, we remember the judges, lawyers and doctors who gave decisions on Kunan Poshpora, Asiya Neelofar, we remember you all, and WE ARE COMING FOR YOU!!! In case Indian machinery thinks that Kashmiri women are stagnant or women with no agency who will flow with the “naari shakti” or “beti bachao beti padhao” colonial agendas, WE AREN’T. We are not buying any of your tactics. We are watching everything and we will not be standing still. It is only a matter of time when the revolution resurfaces on roads where Kashmiri women will drag the women who worked for the colonial machinery and lost the humane, Kashmiri and women element in themselves such as Hina Bhatt and Darakhshan Andrabi of BJP or Mehbooba Mufti and their ilk. We know you all, and we are watching you 24*7, all those self-proclaimed artists who are compromising on Tehreek and collaborating with Chinar Corps and other Bollywood appropriators such as Salim Sulaiman, Danish Renzu and others. We Kashmiri women dare these colonialism enablers to sit on a table with Asiya Andrabi or any other Kashmiri women from any corner of Kashmir and talk about women’s rights. But we know there would not be any because their women right isms are shallow and are drawn from India’s colonialism of Kashmir and we the Kashmiri women keep the tradition of rejecting India’s facade of celebrating International Women’s Day in Kashmir alive. We do not believe in compromised rights, and we will not let the Indian colonialist machinery subjugate our Kashmiri men and women, and compromise with women’s rights or the Freedom of Kashmir. The colonial country is not in any moral position to talk about women’s rights or celebrate the day in Kashmir since the colonialist Indian state does not believe in Kashmiris having the basic rights in the first place such as Freedom of Kashmir, total sovereignty from India.

There is enough of the cultural appropriation where Indian machinery has appropriated our culture such as Pherans and shawls and trying to “integrate” Kashmir with India not realizing Kashmiri women are watching this show of assimilation of Kashmiris. We have been silent for a long time now, and the time for the colonial masters and their enablers to fall has begun. Their fall is arriving faster than they can imagine since we Kashmiri women are joining our Kashmiri men in all ways to bring the revolution on the roads and we will be marching through Tiger Broadway, Burhan Chowk, Afzal Avenue , Professor Rafi Street, Neelofar Road and Tufail Bridge with AK 47s. The war began when India stepped in Kashmir in 1947 and we the Muslim women are not staying quiet. We draw collaborations from South America to the Middle East and we are promising the fall of colonialism in Kashmir. We the Kashmiri women are not letting bihaer settlements in Kashmir, we are coming for all those in literal and metaphorical sense who compromise, settle, and expand the Indian occupation of Kashmir be it through bureaucracy or the charade of art. We are coming for all those artists who derive their art from the collective pain of Kashmir, make careers out of our suffering, and work with Operation Sadbhavna and Chinar Corps of Indian Occupational Forces.

Kashmiri women are coming for you all  

On this International Women’s Day, we let the world know that Kashmiri Women are not any fragile and docile bodies, we are fierce women with agency who believe in the freedom of Kashmir and we are willing to go to any length to achieve this ultimate goal. We believe in no charade of India’s peace, where India is a master and we Kashmiri women are their docile slaves. Resistance runs in our blood, we have given birth to heroes. Asiya Andrabi comes from our blood, and so do Parveena Ahanger, Naseema Bano and many others. We are Muslims and we believe in bowing to one and only- Allah, we live by la Ialaha Ilallah and thus none of India’s warfare tactics are going to work.

This write up featured on March Issue of the last year