Women played key role in keeping their wards away from protests

Arun Joshi

Jammu, August 22

Given the sombre mood in Kashmir, it is not known how the new generation will react to the nullification of Articles 370 and 35A.

This generation, in the age group between 14 and 25, about 43 per cent of the Valley’s population of 7.5 million, has not taken to streets in the numbers in the anticipated fear of the government, thanks largely to the mothers who did not allow them to experiment with violent adventurism. This is not the permanent retreat. The anger is simmering and it may boil over any time. All it needs is a spark. The mothers are playing the role of keeping a lid on their emotions. While they are themselves anguished and deeply angry over what has happened, they have kept their anger to themselves and played a role of counsellor for their children. They were the real therapists who played on familial values.

The youth has not spoken till date, excepting for a few angry faces and voices captured on cameras in which young boys vow to fight unto last to save their identity that they believed was secure with the special status under Articles 370 and Article 35A and their exclusive rights on owning the land and jobs in Jammu and Kashmir.

It can mean multiple things all at once: to strive for saving their land, Kashmiri Muslim identity, language, traditions, cuisine and culture. There is a widespread fear of the cultural invasion swamping everything that is dear to them.

Extraordinarily shrill noises about the boisterous claims about Kashmir was now free for all and also that the bachelors are entitled to marry “Kashmiri girls”, are stoking the anger further. The youth is not immune to the scary scenarios that are being spread as an advancement of the national narrative in Kashmir. In the first few days after August 5 when the Valley was brought under a complete shadow of ban on everything – movement, communications clampdown and with security personnel strutting with their weapons, youths driven by emotions, were bent upon taking to streets with stones and Pakistani flags to provoke the security personnel. But they were told by their mothers to wait, “it is not the time to play with fire”. This was to cool their tempers, some of the women who had difficulty in keeping the high tempers in check shared with the visiting reporters. A simple logic was at work, no mother wanted to see the funeral of their children. They knew that the provocation was high, but this time they were able to keep their wards in check, using the emotions, “what would happen to us if you are gone”.

But it was interpreted as if the mothers were telling that the right time for protest will come, wait for that.

The huge deployment of the forces and the Internet shutdown that curbed the mischief on social media also worked in their favour to soothe the tempers. “Our major worry is how the young will behave?” observed a middle-aged woman in the suburbs of Srinagar, she said pointing towards her two sons who were busy with games on mobile. There was no Internet and the mobile phones were useful for the games only. The life is easing, but the test for mothers in Kashmir is getting tougher.