Echoes from the Valley

… Sunil waited for Roshan to compose himself, then said softly, “Now tell me. It will help to ease the pain in your heart if you try to unburden yourself.” “You know, there are so many clichés one hears,” Roshan said sardonically, “the biggest ones are that time is the big healer, and that sharing halves one’s pain. But some gashes are so deep that they seem to take a life-time to heal – if at all. I’ve heard that long after an arm or a leg is amputated, the brain still sends signals to the ends from which it was severed, making the person feel as if it were still there. Only the evidence of the eyes lays bare the reality of the loss. With me there is no physical deformity to grieve over; the wounds are all buried deep inside – festering sores that refuse to go away. The loss of my sister, the loss of my friends, the loss of my birth place and legacy, and more than anything, the loss of faith in humanity – the loss of humanity itself; where does one go – who does one turn to for solace, for healing?” Roshan paused and looked at Sunil, “I’m sorry. I’m being unfair to you. I suppose when one encounters lack of civility for a long period of time it rubs off on one’s psyche.” Roshan took a long gulp from his bottle of beer and lay back on the grass, staring into the pale blue sky above. “Ten years back we were a happy family of four: me, my parents and my little sister,” he began. “And I had two very dear friends who had been with me throughout our schooling and afterwards. Life flowed so peacefully that there seemed to be no scope for turmoil. O there was turmoil all around us – what with terrorists and fundamentalists and separatists and so on – but it did not touch us in our daily lives; except for the occasional curfews and calls for hartal. “It was just after I had joined college that things started to show signs of change; a change that was so weird in the context of the culture of Kashmir valley that it appeared bizarre. For generations all communities in the valley had lived in harmony. True our faiths were different and our living styles and eating habits, but these were mutually accepted and respected. We all lived as one non-communal community. That is where the change started taking place – and the pace at which it was happening was bizarre. The alienation was seeded in spring and it exploded in autumn. It appeared as if an invisible hand had hovered over the valley and covered it with its dark shadow …