Investing blood!

Ishrat Bashir

The Tulip Garden is in full bloom. Air hangs low with fragrance. Zabarwan hills stand majestic, watching over the fountain of joy. It seems as if millions of rainbows have rendezous with flowers in this earthly abode of love. The kaliedoscopic garden reflects its colors onto the faces of the people.A merry group of school children are singing Mehjoor’s poetry under a chinar:

“walo haa baagwano, baharuk shaan paid kar,
pholan gul gath karan bulbul, tithu’y saamaan paida kar."

An unruly butterfly sits on a pink tulip. Suddenly a green-gloved hand approaches it and it hovers away. The fingers slip on to the tulip and it withered as if someone has poured acid over it. What is left is a big dark void. Feeling the shiver down her spine, she wakes up.

Wiping the sweat off her forehead,she remembered the fateful night when she first had this dream. How it had left her transfixed with terror! Ever since she wakes up like this in the dead of the night with the dream and the sleep deserts her.With the muezzin’s call, she got up. Having offered her fajr prayers, she opened the front gate of the lawn and pulled the newspaper off the handle of the gate where the newspaper boy leaves it daily. Flicking through the paper, she caught a glimpse of a picture with a tribute “Remembering Basit on his First Death Anniversary” by Chinar Valley School, which has seen the cherub passing into the boyhood. Something stirred in her. She wondered if a whole year had really passed. She felt that she could still touch her wound and feel the blood on her finger. Time had come to a standstill for her. Caressing the picture, she instinctively came to his room. She sat on the bed that Basit used to leave messed up in the morning. She would always be mad at him for this and he would rejoin “No worry Mum.I will do it myself when I be back”.

It seemed only yesterday.This is the bed where Arun Bahl’s Organic Chemistry was left open . She had come back from the bank late that day. It was curfew in Kashmir. The van that left her at home had to snake through concertina barricades on the deserted dog-strewn streets. Leaving her bag in the living room, she hurried to Basit’s room to see if he is studying, whether he’s not busy on Facebook that has become his favourite pass-time recently. She picked up her mobile and called him. “Where are you. Why don’t you listen to me Basit, why do you annoy me like this… don’t you have a paper tomorrow? Where are you?”, she cried out into the phone. “Mum, I am coming. I just got irritated with that organic stuff... Thought to make a round to the Square, just to refresh my mind”, said Basit in a pacifying tone. “Alright but come now quickly?” entreated she. “I am here , near Majeed uncle’s shop. I am coming. Mum, make tea for me. I just come”. Basit was in 12th class. His Board Exams were going on. It was his last paper tomorrow. He didn’t like organic chemistry. “Mum! You know what… studying organic chemistry is like biting the bullet. Life Sciences is interesting and a lively subject” Basit would say.

While she was busy making tea, she heard gunshots outside. She called Basit . The ringtone, Give me some sunshine, give me some rain, give me another chance I wanna grow up once again kept ringing but no one answered. Panic rose in her like the smoke from teargas canister, she went to the gate and looked out in the street, her lips murmuring “ Khodayas t’i Nabiyas chu hawaal’i’(God and Prophet protect him)”. She called him again and got the answer, “The destination you are trying to reach is not available.” She kept trying Basit’s number. The phone rang. She grabbed the receiver and before she could say Hello, there was great commotion outside her house. She hung up and came rushing into the lawn. A group of boys came into the lawn with a body on a stretcher. Women came out of the houses, wailing and beating their breasts. She stood motionless in the porch and the dark void of her dream came rushing to engulf her and she remembered no more.

Her nephew later related how Basit was killed mercilessly. While Basit was coming back, he had met his cousin who lived in the neighbourhood. They had been chatting a little by the turn of the lane when a group of boys came running towards them. The duo stood watching them and as they saw police, they too started running away . Police fired many rounds of bullets and one of them hit Basit in his side. As he fell to the ground, the boys ran towards him but the police fired at them. They dashed into a by-lane for cover dragging Basit’s cousin with them. They witnessed how the men in uniform kicked Basit’s head in before his cellphone was smashed against the shutter of a shop. When the police left him unconscious in a pool of blood, the boys had removed him to the hospital where doctors declared him “brought dead” as if she had never brought him alive into this world.

Engrossed in her past that has become a perpetual present for her, she hadn’t seen her husband coming into the room who had called her from Dubai on that fateful day when she hung up without answering him. Through her tears, she saw his face red with fury and outrage. He flung a newspaper towards her. She read a list of parents who would be given ex gratia by the State. Smiling through her tears, she said “ why are you so angry? We Kashmiris are an ungrateful lot! Rather than appreciating such unprecedented benevolence of the State, you show such temper?.See the ex-gratia is now FIVE LAKH instead of the traditional ONE LAKH. We should learn to look at the positive side of the things… Our economy is soaring high! Naya Kashmir is in the making. Given the disadvantageous position of our Valley, we have to invest the blood wherein other people invest their sweat. You see the logic! And remember we have a Tryst with destiny!

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