Putting Kashmir back in the Spotlight

Book: Kaash Kashmir
Author: Rajesh Talwar
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A lot of fictional books have been written which traverse the Kashmir issue in its different dimensions. However, most of them are in the form of novels and few plays have been written about the interplay of different factors and stakeholders in this issue. Author Rajesh Arora comes up with a play “Kaash Kashmir” (If only....Kashmir), which explores it with a story of love and loss in this beautiful valley.
The book revolves around Rohan, a Kashmiri Hindu boy and Ayesha, a Kashmiri Muslim girl. In the opening scene, Rohan, then a teenage boy of school going years confesses his love to the young Ayesha. Their families, the Pandits and the Shahs are neighbours in Kashmir. However, soon after the blossoming of this love, Rohan and his family, along with thousands of other Kashmiri Pandits, are forced to leave Srinagar in early 1990s, in the Kashmiri Pandit exodus. The family stays in a refugee camp in Jammu at first, awaiting the possibility of return; but with hopes of return rapidly dwindling, they eventually move to Delhi. Rohan, who is still in school, decides to join the Indian Army.
After ten years, Rohan, now a major in the army, is transferred to Srinagar, where he encounters Ayesha and her brother who is now part of the independence movement. In the aftermath of these events, what course would the life of these protagonists and the Kashmir issue take? Will Rohan and Ayesha’s romance be rekindled? Will Ayesha’s brother be arrested or killed by the Indian army? The play explores such questions in the complex narrative.
The book should be given considerable credit for bringing the narrative of the Kashmir issue in a play form. However, the dialogues are long-winded and not very expressive. Also, the book has some implausible glitches, which are mostly ignorant, like there is celebration of Dusshera in December and one line says that there are three decades between 1971 and 1991. The author has written a factual narrative, which is tenable and offers mostly well grounded information in this fictional storyline. But given the assertions in the blurb that it explores sensitive issues in a fair and compassionate manner trying to bring in all points of view, one finds the narrative somehow tilting in the direction of the right- wing ideology. This can be accepted in the denouement which states that the interest of Kashmiris is best served by their choosing to remain with India, but other instances need to be discussed more, not one-dimensionally but from an all encompassing perspective.
This play unravels the modern history of Kashmir for readers who know that the Kashmir issue is politically and sentimentally contentious, but are unaware or have little information of the recent upheavals that have led to the current political situation. For those who know about the complexity of this issue, reading this fictional narrative will have the effect of a revisitation, and will make them to ponder about the effect the Kashmir dispute, with all its share of territorial skirmishes and political vendettas, has had on the lives of the Kashmiri people. The play can also be put in the spotlight by enacting it in theatres, by choosing particular episodes from the book and shortening of the hefty dialogues, to have a wider outreach.