The Kashmir Files.
The Kashmir files.
Where do I begin?
There is so much that I want to
say, yet everything is so overwhelming that I can barely process what I am
feeling after watching The Kashmir files. There is so much to talk about yet I
am unable to find the perfect words for it. This is a humble attempt at trying
to describe my reaction after watching the movie rather than a review. Because
real history can only be reacted to, it cannot and must not be reviewed.
Kindly bear with me for few
minutes.
I remember being afraid even
before entering the cinema hall. It was an afternoon show jam packed with
people from almost all the age groups. I had never seen such a rush in a cinema
hall post covid. My heart was happy looking at all those people, yet I was
scared to what was about to be seen by me on the silver screen. Being an all-time
movie buff, I was and am still in love with movies and the silver screen. It
has made me laugh, made me cry, but this time I wasn’t ready to what it was
about to throw at me; real, naked, hard-hitting truth. The truth of our own
people, of our own brothers and sisters. The truth of our nation, the truth of
our governance, the truth of the entire left eco system that has its roots buried
so deep that it has essentially become a physical part of our nation. The truth
of Kashmir, which was and always be an inseparable part of our nation.
Thus began the film. Everyone stood
up for the national anthem and I could see every last soul standing straight,
in an attention position, proudly singing the national anthem with unity. Every
last person in that cinema hall felt like an Indian to me for those 52 seconds.
There was no gender, no caste, no color, no age. We were just beings belonging
to one nation. At the end someone chanted “Bharat mata ki jay” and there were
literal goosebumps on my body. The sheer utterance of these words always makes
the atmosphere so charged that I can barely contain the emotion. I am unapologetic
about the love I have for my nation and you may laugh at me for all I care.
The film captured my attention since
the very first shot where Shiva Pandit is seen playing cricket with his friends
in a snow-clad Kashmir. Right from that shot where he hits a six with a bat to
the end where Shiva is hit in his head with a bullet, right from the scene
where Shiva’s mother Sharada is seen singing lullaby to her few months old
child to her being made to eat rice soaked in her husband’s blood to her chanting
“Om namah shivay” while being cut into two halves with a chain saw, right from
Pushkarnath Pandit preparing for Shivratri to him dying with an unfulfilled wish
of returning to his house he was thrown out of to his ashes being spread in his
house in Kashmir, right from Krishna Pandit trying to become a woke to his
speech where he acknowledges recognizing his identity as a Kashmiri Pandit
after learning the truth about his life, right from Radhika Menon patronizing and
brain washing everyone into believing that Kashmir was never a part of our
nation to the part where she grins and says “Government kisi ki bhi ho, system
to humara hai”, right from Bitta killing Shiva’s father to the part where he
convinces Krishna that he is freedom fighter not a terrorist, I was clinching
my fist tightly, trying hard to get hold of my emotions. At the end of the
movie, I could see a few people who were overwhelmed, even I could barely
process what I had seen.
Wikipedia describes this movie as
“a ploy to foster prejudice against Muslims” and that the movie is facing “charges
of historical revisionism” which mean re-interpretation of historical facts.
Whoever wrote this should die in shame, especially if the editor is a Hindu for
not recognizing the pain of his own brother and sister. Krishna Pandit’s speech
was indeed the highlight of the movie as it summarized the entire story of our
youth today, who is directionless, confused about their identity, their
belonging but once they learn the truth from authentic sources, they convert
from a woke to a non-woke. The chants of “raliv, galiv, chaliv” which means “convert,
leave or die”, still haunt me at night and they are still being echoed in the valleys
of Kashmir. These chants have supressed the screams of innocent Kashmiri pandits
who were thrown out of their houses overnight, the screams of women who were
brutally gang-raped, the screams of those small innocent Hindu kids who were
left to become orphans, whose parents and sibling were brutally murdered in
front of their eye. Those chants haunt me in at night and my mind travels back those
valleys of Kashmir, once so beautiful, full of knowledge, slowly diving into
the darkness of extremism, terrorism and separatism.
For me, Anupam Kher’s character
of Pushkar Nath Pandit represented all those Kashmiris left to die in their own
country by their own people, and those who barely survived still living as a refugee
in their own “democratic” and “independent” country, Darshan Kumar’s character Krishna
Pandit represented today’s youth that has become so disconnected with its own
roots, history, culture and dharma that they have become such easy targets that
can be brainwashed in seconds. Pallavi Joshi’s character of Radhika Menon
represented the entire left eco system that has done the job of peddling lies,
white washing our history, glorifying our perpetrators, gaslighting the victims
into believing they brought this upon themselves by justifying the act of
terrorism and lastly Bhasha Sumbli’s character of Sharada represented Kashmir
itself. Sharada means Goddess Saraswati, the goddess of knowledge and Kashmir
that once used to be the hub of knowledge has been stripped off of its glory and
has been silenced forever by the noise of the guns, the chants of “azadi” exactly
the way Sharada’s dignity was stripped off in front of everyone and we have
been just mute spectators since then.
A dialogue from the movie “टूटे हुए लोग बताते नहीं उन्हें सुना जाता है” has been so impactful that my eyes are
full of tears even while writing this. Kahsmiri Pandits’ voice has been
supressed for more than three decades. They haven’t been listened to ever since.
If this is not a genocide, then what is it? First the Islamic extremist killed
them, then our governance did, then the so called “judicial system” did by
saying “It has been 27 years and it will difficult to gather data” and finally
their own countrymen did. They have been hurt time and again and it is high time
their story be shown to the world. I have watched “Schindler’s list”, “the
Pianist”, “The boy in the stripped pyjamas” and I have wept like a child. Do
not tell me that I am not supposed to cry for my own fucking countrymen who
were made to go through all this simply because they were Hindus in their own
fucking independent country.
I hope there are more brave
filmmakers who dare make movies on real stories without mincing their words and
stop the monkey balancing act. I hope that our real stories are told to the world.
I hope we learn from our mistakes. I hope these mistakes be rectified so that
we can heal. I hope we acknowledge and face our truth. I hope this awakes the
youth and make them ready for what is undeniable the future of our country. I
hope we reconnect with our roots. I hope Kashmiri Pandits are reinstated and
reunited with their valley.
I hope those valleys of Kashmir would
finally blossom someday with the knowledge it once possessed and it is returned
its lost glory. I hope it once again becomes the heaven on Earth and only then
will our country and our people heal.
Jay Hind.
Jay Bharat.
Jay Shri Ram.
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