J vs K

the streets of this “city of temples” there is the heat of rage. As the protests gather steam, there are restrictions on movement but these don’t work. If they aren’t part of an angry crowd, men and women squat on pavements, talking with soldiers. The subject is the same wherever you go: the revocation of land transfer to the Amarnath Shrine Board. And the verdict is unanimous: the decision is “anti- Hindu” and another bit of evidence that the state bows before the “anti-national separatist” Kashmiri Muslims, disregarding the sentiments of those who live in “nationalist” Jammu.

The agitation has spread across Jammu and is seen as a befitting reply to Kashmir’s nine-day protest, which ultimately led to the revocation of the land transfer. And the organisers of the agitation, the Amarnath Sangharsh Samiti, have snapped the only road link connecting the Valley with the rest of the country, the Lakhanpur-Srinagar national highway, to enforce a successful economic blockade all over Kashmir.

I arrive at the Jammu airport from Srinagar—my plan was to take the highway on my way back. In fact, the airport lounge in Srinagar was a vivid reminder: the Kashmiris were at the Arrival returning in droves from strife-torn Jammu while Departure was crowded by those who wanted to rush home to Jammu, apprehending a sudden surge in violence in Srinagar.

Jammu is under curfew. A few taxi drivers stand waiting for elusive passengers, rushing to every person who comes out of the airport. But the stretch leading to the city has only army men positioned around roadblocks. For the first time in Jammu, you could see barbed wire scrolls strewn across the road.

I had missed the major protest of the day at Muthi camp where migrant Kashmiri Pandits had come out in support of the agitation. I stop at a cross-section in Nanak Nagar, a neighbourhood inhabited by a large Sikh population. “Jammu always feels discriminated against,” says an elderly man in a gray beard and saffron turban. “And when the land was taken back from the Shrine Board, it again showed that the government wants to appease Kashmiris,” he says. Where does he stand on the issue, I ask. “We live here,” he says. “I think the government mishandled the situation. Now they will have to resolve this issue wisely. The government has to calm both the places simultaneously.’’

A man sitting next to him joins the conversation. He introduces himself only by his first name. “I am Subhash,” he says. “The people of Jammu will never stop this agitation till the land is given back. It’s Baba Bhole Nath’s land.”

By now, a small group has gathered and suddenly I don’t have to ask questions. “Jammu ka Hindu jag gaya hai (The Hindu of Jammu has woken up),” another man says. “Tell Kashmiris, we will not accept their high handedness any longer,” he says. “They are anti-national. They don’t want to be with India. And still, the government gives them more than it gives to Jammu,” says a middle-aged man.

Jammu city and Srinagar are the winter and summer capitals of the state. Like the sharp contrast of these seasons, these two cities represent the deep divide, both in the grievances and the aspirations of their residents. The Amarnath land transfer row, however, has brought a dangerous fault line to the surface: it is now Hindu Jammu versus Muslim Kashmir and this simmering communal divide feeds itself on two opposite perceptions and sets of facts which have roots in history as well as the recent separatist militant movement in Kashmir and the hilly Muslim dominated districts of Rajouri, Poonch and Doda.

The National Highway 1 that links Jammu with Srinagar is a road that divides more than it connects. My companion and driver on the journey is 30-year-old Raman Varma who works with a travel agency in Jammu. The Amarnath land row has had another ironic fallout—the licence plate of a vehicle can either help you cross the protesting mob smoothly on the highway or it can seriously jeopardise your safety. To the Jammu mob protesting against the land transfer revocation, a vehicle with a number plate JK01 represents the enemy; in Kashmir, a vehicle with JK02 license is an open invitation to trouble. Raman drove a car with a JK02 number plate. He tells me he had been an active protestor for the past several days, shouting slogans and pelting stones. “Because there was no work. And I did think the land must be given back to Amarnath,” he explains. “Kashmiris have been bad to us.”

His words are of little comfort to me. I am apprehensive initially, fearing he may give me up in the event that we are waylaid by a mob. But by the time we drive out of Jammu city, we are already friends. Our sudden bond was not formed by any consensus about the future of J&K or the land issue, it was a conversation on death. Though a staunch supporter of the Jammu agitation, Raman is not happy that mobs were attacking poor truck drivers only because they were Kashmiri. “It’s not good when people die,” he says, referring to the mob frenzy in both Jammu and Kashmir. “Anyway, it is the poor who always die in such cases.”

Then he opens up. Raman had lost his mother and brother when a hospital building collapsed several years ago. His other brother had been killed in an accident.

I tell him of my plan in case of an emergency. “If we are stopped by a mob, we should tell them we are on our way to Patnitop and not Kashmir. And I don’t want you to disclose my name to them. If we are in a spot, remember my name is Rohit. I am a Kashmiri and I have come from Delhi,” I reel out instructions.

We cross Nagrota, the first major trouble spot on the national highway with relative ease. People have gathered on both sides of the road. We slow down but nobody stops us. Perhaps the JK02 number plate of the car was our licence to be out of trouble’s reach. Occasionally, cars and scooters would come from the opposite direction. Despite government claims that supplies to Kashmir have been restored, there are hardly any trucks for miles together.

We stop for water at Nandini. Raman, however, doesn’t let me get out of the car. There is no electricity and a group of people sits around a fire. Jajarkotli ahead was calm, partly because of the presence of a police contingent. Then the rain comes down. The drizzle helps us cross Tikri where a group of boys whistle and shout at us. Raman speeds up.

We are approaching Udhampur and I can feel Raman grow anxious. “If we cross Udhampur without any trouble, we will be fine,” he says. The rain has stopped completely by now. He slows the car. That will make people think we are locals and are in no hurry to get out. “Then the people will see the JK02 number plate too,” he explains.

From a distance we see many people standing at a brightly lit corner of the road. We don’t realise what lies ahead. “It’s a protest,” Raman whispers and slows down. We inch towards the crowd that looks larger as we get closer. A large tent is pitched on the roadside and a saffron clad priest sits on a raised platform. A few men stand around holding trishuls. The protest looks almost over. Another car overtakes us and nobody is really paying attention to us. Raman keeps on driving.

Chenani figures on the list of danger zones for a Valley bound vehicle but we cross it too without trouble. So, when we stop near Kud to talk to truck drivers, we are told that other than occasional but sudden barrage of stones, nights are now safe for smaller vehicles. “But not for us. Not for trucks,” says Ramesh Singh, a driver from Sarol Bagh in Bhaderwah. “A Kashmiri truck or a car is in danger till Kud. Once they start the climb up Patnitop, they have almost made it,” he says. Most of the trucks there have been damaged by protestors in the Valley. “They see a truck from Jammu and start pelting stones,” he says. These drivers from Jammu had heard that Kashmiri truck drivers were being attacked with petrol bombs and stones right from Lakhanpur to Udhampur. Eight Kashmiri drivers had been admitted to hospitals in Jammu while one seriously wounded driver had to be airlifted to Delhi for treatment.

“It is madness. People attack their trucks here and then they pelt stones at us,” says Satvir Singh, a truck driver from Jammu. “If any of the injured Kashmiri drivers die, hell will break loose.”

The truck drivers want desperately to be kept out of this “ladayi jhagda (fighting)”. “We work very hard and it’s difficult to make ends meet. Why are people targetting us?’’ says another driver, Satnam Singh.

We take leave of the drivers and move ahead. No trucks are moving in either direction now. In fact, there is no one on the road. We drive slowly for another half an hour through the fog as we go up Patnitop peak and then descend through dense pine forests. As the night grows darker, electric bulbs glow in far-flung villages, lighting up the mountains. We see two men loading a truck with boxes. “What fruit is this?” I ask.

In their answer was embedded a story of hope. Mohamamd Shabir Wani and Bhagwan Singh are from Sanasar village in Patnitop. They are friends and do business together. “We want peace. We are poor people,” says Shabir, an ex-armyman. “We deal with pears. And during the last two weeks, we have lost two truckloads. They were stuck in Basohli for few days and everything was finished,” explains Bhagwan Singh.

Wani says though they speak pure Dogri, the people of Jammu do not consider them Dogra. “We travel to Jammu and they say we are Kashmiri. We go to Kashmir and there we are told we are from Jammu,” he says. His friend Bhagwan Singh chips in: “We have never had a Hindu-Muslim riot here.” Shabir adds: “If ever a fight breaks out between Shabir and Bhagwan, it will be between Shabir and Bhagwan and not between a Muslim and a Hindu.”

As we pass through the border of Doda district, we leave the heat of Jammu’s agitation far behind. We cross Ramban town, situated on the banks of the Chenab. We drive on through the night and finally arrive at Banihal. Here we come across a large group of Amarnath pilgrims sleeping under the sky. The government has stationed State Road Transport Corporation buses at Jammu railway station to ferry yatris to Pahalgam. Kamal Joshi and Mahesh Chagal have come all the way from Nagpur. “This is my first yatra,” says Joshi.

The pilgrims, however, have an unpleasant tale to share. They had boarded an SRTC bus at 9 a.m. and at midnight when they arrived at the Jawahar tunnel, they were told it was shut. So the driver asked them to sleep inside the bus. “It was suffocating,” says Joshi. “So we took our sheets and slept here under the open sky.”

We stay at Banihal for a few hours, waiting for dawn and for the tunnel to open. At 7.30 a.m., I say goodbye to Raman at the entrance of the tunnel. Across the tunnel lies Kashmir Valley and the JK02 licence plate of his car will now be an open invitation to trouble. So Raman leaves and I cross the tunnel alone.