Mannan Wani

 

یہ فیضانِ نظر تھا یا کے مکتب کی کرامت
سکھاے کس نے اسمعیل کو آدابِ فرزندی ….

To the digital audience, mostly educated, I had written a piece in CNS Kashmir, calling for contemplation and the revision of views. But within a span of 6 hours, the Indian state in an utter frustration decided to blackout the links and brought them down. It was not the civil administration that threatened the press and the people, but it was the military set up that was upset and shaken. The fact is that our occupier lacks the spine to bear our word, leave the bullet. Even our words shiver ‘the world’s largest democracy’.
Those who are developing an antithesis for the weapon wielder using the ink, let the genesis of my new role be known to them and all. I am writing this piece for the special audience, a different one than earlier.
Remember, I was born in the hills and I am back to them again. Meanwhile, I have realized my mode of resistance. From my birth, I have been surrounded by military boots, and even my school functions were held at army camps. My elementary studies too have a military base. I was taught at Jawahar Navodiya Vidyaliya – the educational extension of the Indian occupation in Kashmir. By then, my imagery of India was a fantasy, and my aspirations were similar to a true Indian. I graduated from a College in Srinagar and engaged in understanding the discourses and identified the difference of being.
I was reading politics, learning sciences and deliberating on the streams of ideas. I was looking around and identifying my place in society. I was growing, interacting and knowing. By 2009, I began synthesizing my own wisdom, and I developed my own critique. I was selected for the University of Kashmir; however, its suffocation led to a change of mind. I opted for a leading Indian varsity at Aligarh, which is contesting its history in the courts of law. My beautiful alma-mater was born to the blood of Muslims, and today it is facing the atrocious Hindutva. I am sure that the spirit of the Founder will overwhelm the tirade of the fascists and my garden will bloom.
My University life was beyond an M. Phil or a Ph.D. Degree. I was active and political. The Dhabas would feed my belly, my bosom, and my brain. I led the campaigns that brought student leaders to thrones, and reach the hall of the dispute where the picture of the Founder of Pakistan is still hanging – symbolizing an identity which Indian Muslims may need again in the Tharoor’s emerging India. India of Nehru and Gandhi gave us a Sachhar Report; the New India is preparing the templates for the obituaries of the lynched.
I would travel on and off, only to feel pity for the sorry state of India. From the ‘nominated’ dirtiest cities of the World to watch the millions suffering from malnutrition, thoughts of the Booker prize winner would reverberate my mind that India wants Azadi from Kashmir, and not vice versa. India is a poor nation, and that Freedom is inevitable for Kashmir was her claim and it was like a Gospel truth. I did analyze the wisdom of those in chairs who wanted us to abandon false hope and macabre heroism and work towards a dignified exit from the conflict. However, I trusted that woman more than the man; she was not the part of the system and hence more truthful. She was free and hence correct; she was the agency of none. She was strong, truthful and wise.
Back home, India was a trigger-happy nation drenching my paradise into the blood. The bloodbath was a consequence of politics of imposition, deceit, and manipulation. My peoples’ will was an element of hate for the occupier. I left the pen and made a conscious decision to stare at Indian forces holding a rifle in my hand. Because the only way India was holding my land was by her military might. My choice to fight the ‘emerging superpower’ had to halt for more than a year as I was waiting for the approval of my brothers in the field. Today, I am happy and at more peace because I am genuinely fighting the battle of my own. I am reasonably satisfied with the redressal mechanism, I chose. Remember, where the history has to be saffron, allegiance has to be to Dogras, subjugation has to be the identity, and compromise has to be the principle, only the bruised souls can try ‘an anchor’. A place where the interests of the occupier run supreme and undeclared war on a civilian population is the modus operandi, black laws define the activism and politics is a prostitute, restoring the dignity of one’s own self by a non-violent culture is a false hope. When the occupier is uncivilized, its collective conscience is bloodthirsty, its morality is deceit, its mindset is hegemonic and it thinks through the barrel of the gun, the response cannot be a peace talk, it has to be to crush her arrogance. The military footprints are the only thing that defines Indian strength in Kashmir, and challenging the military might alone will compel India to respect the aspiration of the occupied. Limited war of today may swell for the same reason, someday.
The resistance was never mindless. It was preferred by Nadeem Khateeb, educated in the US and born to the Chief Engineer, and today our faith in the gun is equally strong. The Indian Army Chief’s assertion that gun will stay active on both of the sides is to acknowledge that India will never be able to subjugate us into submission. His men will continue with the genocide agenda but the visible failure of the military approach has made them weak and tense. His soldiers come in thousands in the bulletproof vehicles to face one of us, fire from a mile, rocket the bricks, and all of this is our strength, and not theirs. His men are committing suicide; ours are smiling even when laid to the graves. While death and destruction by Indian state is a routine, the more people aspiring to die than those being killed indicates the peoples’ power to fight.

True, that we are martyred, but occupations are born to kill, the option is to die as a fighter or as a duck. We chose to be fighters. Civilians, who come to save us at encounter sites are brave and make a case for a referendum in our favor. They are not armchair fighters, they are real. Massive funerals are a political statement and writing on the wall.
Those who feel that this is a glorification of pain must remember that we cannot sanctify the pain of being a slave. We cannot allow the occupant to dictate what to speak and when to speak. Being free is our religion and its consciousness is our survival. We prefer to face the ruler than to beg for concessions. Unlike some, we don’t trust the courts because we are not blind to our own history. The winds blowing from the graves of our martyrs in Tihar, hanged by the sanction of the highest court tell us that India has an only bloodthirsty collective conscience for our heroes. This court has no word for the forcibly disappeared or the unlawfully jailed. We don’t intend to secure a job; we want to live a dignified life.
The history is a witness that Delhi’s only interest in Kashmir is to cultivate a nursery of collaborators, in politics, establishment, and society. Though the dead collaborators are guarded even in their graves, their young have expressed lack of power in the seats of power and some have been dethroned in a humiliating manner, yet these shameless and emasculated people continue to seek Chairs to kill, maim and rape the native citizens. The breed of collaborators that is emerging and the new fronts being cobbled are only to downplay the peoples’ will. The Police functions to kill and civil servants are enthusiastic PSA appliers. These mercenaries are plainly the colonial agencies, nothing more. My choice for the gun is also a response to these elite, the product of a fraudulent democracy, worst occupation and allegedly intellectual.
Our political history has found them as the slaves of the lowest kind. They all are well aware of the history of the transformation of the constituent assembly into the house of filth, they remember the days of the prison of the grand man of Kashmir, they felt the rebuke by the Indian PM and died of cardiac breakdown, and their chairs fell shamelessly when the mats were taken off. They speak in the auditoriums of the elite institutions but are asked, how they sleep in the night. We understand that this nexus of our people with the brutal occupier is a worry. We thought that shame has a height, but our special class has no moral compass. To these sold out souls, we reiterate the words of the Master Martyr Burhan Wani who asked them to stand by their own people and join the struggle against occupation. We ask them for civil disobedience. We do ask them, ‘how do you sleep in the nights’. Someone must ask them to read the latest UNHCR report in the dim light on a calm night and question their loyalties as to whom do they belong to.
To people, we say don’t fall in the same trap every day. Don’t vote, because even if you vote, you will be dragged by the bonnet and humiliated. If you stay away from the ballots, you will save yourself from their bullets in the long run. Those who beg you for votes are being sold as peoples’ support to the integrationist agenda. Stay away from them; you may be deprived of a Sadak, but that a small sacrifice against the deceit they play with you. If you don’t shame them in the society, they will continue to shame you as a nation.
As we are witnessing a surge in the seekers of armed struggle, we want to convey to people that things are going in a planned manner. Limited war must not be taken as our weakness; it is to offer a scope for the wise. Yes, we tell you that if you are not holding a gun, don’t stay as ducks but expose India at all platforms and ensure that India turns restless. Every action by any section of society is the strength of this movement. The peoples’ support, especially from the students of universities, colleges and schools, is making us strong
Our struggle is gender neutral; it has seen the women being raped and the men too. The sacrifices of the women are our motivation. They have offered their modesty, their eyes, and lives. Our sacrifice is nothing compared to theirs. We want them to be brave, active and resilient. We together make the nation, and together we the fight the occupation.
Our leadership must ensure unity, strength and the commitment to the cause of the people of Kashmir. The sacredness of this movement will never be allowed to be brokered.
I have told you that narratives and meta-narratives are being generated like the printing in the press. But these narratives have lost the worth in Kashmir. From Kashmiryat to Sports activism, from autonomy to self-rule, from good governance to sadhbhavna, from all party trips to the visit of anti-insurgent peace-nicks, from renegades to self-styled platforms, and from dialogue to interlocution, all these narratives have been punctured. India has been exposed and even world bodies have lately shamed them. Till the path of martyrs is walked, no corrupt narrative will find its space in Kashmir. The day, the gun is silent, their deceit will succeed.
Our cause is crystal clear, and let nobody feel confused. This is the leftover of partition and India has to go. It is the people of Jammu and Kashmir who will determine their future course of society. Our question has never been of being fit in a culturally diverse India, it has fundamentally been of our dignity and right to stand for own selves. A compromise on dignity creates slaves and in slavery, there is no dignity. Our battle has an international recognition, and even the use of the gun is justified for seeking the right to self-determination as per the principles of the United Nations, which India is a signatory of. We have morality, history, peoples’ support and the legal international basis on our side. The only hindrance is the arrogance of India.
I continue with the point made earlier in the CNS article, that as Muslims, we must adhere to the values of Islam which encompass all spheres of life. Islam offers teachings for welfare and justice based state. We respect the freedom of all to choose their own religion. We are neither chauvinists nor fascists. We call for universal brotherhood, While Communalism is the tool of our occupier
To end, I must tell you all that surrender is a weakness and to fight is the strength. For a Brave Nation, Freedom is the Destination. Honour, not exit is our way. My fingers are on the trigger; however, they do touch the keypads to write for my people. Both ways, I stand for Freedom, Truth, and Justice. I ask my readers on social networks to tag the collaborators and make sure that the piece is read by all.
Friends Live happily. I am doing fine. Do enjoy.

Mannan Wani joined Hizbul Mujahideen Jammu Kashmir – an local armed group seeking freedom from Indian occupation. Before joining the armed movement Wani was pursuing a doctorate in geology from Aligarh Muslim University. He was killed by the Indian army on October 11 20,18.

Click to read Mannan Wani’s blog Words Matter [PDF]

Link http://mannan-wani.blogspot.com/

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