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| | Question of origins in Kashmir | | The dilemmas of identity inspire the ‘otherness’ factor | | Kashmir Pandits celebrate two ancient festivals. They are “Gad batte” and “Khechi Mavas.” Of the two “Khechi Mavas” has its origins’ in an incident when Tartar and central Asian tribes of Mongol descent wreaked havoc in Kashmir. This is one part of the story. Many others opine that there is another legend connected to the incident. Yakshas, aborigines of Kashmir were propitiated and their leader Kuber was felicitated with the sumptuous feast of rice mixed with pulses and meat preparations, both of yellow and red varieties were kept atop the heap of this mix. Turnips were added to the yellow variety and a raw, round radish along with some leaves and a piece of pickled knol khol was also kept over the mix. The ritual of keeping the vegetables or meat varies from family to family as per their family rituals over the millennia; for example some even kept an oblong stone over the mix. Subsequently, every Kashmiri contributed his/her bit in one form or the other each time these Central Asian tribes visited Kashmir. It became an annual festival with Kashmiris.
But “Gad batte” or rice and fish festival is clearly of more ancient lineage.
Once upon a time, a tribe called ‘Pishachas’ dwelled on the banks of lake Satisar (original name of Kashmir before it was drained off with the efforts of Rishi Kashyap) in Kashmir. They were fond of rice and fish. Therefore, clearly “Gad batte” has something to do with these ancient tribes.
Now comes the interesting part of the whole thing.
Pishachas as such had nothing to do with these festivals. They were the war-mongers with whom Nila Nag, the serpent-king of Kashmir in those times made a pact. He along with the Aryans from the Sharda Desh (located in PAK on the banks of river Neelum), began to entertain them with festivals in their honour like ‘Gade batte’ to keep them in good humour. (It is another matter that with the passage of time, Pishachas moved to the upper reaches of the valley and got converted later on. Many suggest them to be the present day Gujjars and Bakerwals, but that has yet to be substantiated by the researchers.)
With the passage of time, Pishachas moved to the upper reaches of the valley. They forgot their festivals and it has come upon the shoulders of Kashmiri Pandits to carry forward their festival. So when Professor of History in the University of Kashmir attempted to do racial profiling of Kashmiris in order to separate Kashmiri Pandits from rest of the Kashmir population he forgot this essential philosophical question.
And that question is how festivals of others are celebrated by Kashmir Pandits and at the same time then reinforce the otherness of converted population. This is a dilemma that good Professor and many others of his ilk need to answer.
Check the facts. When Kashmiris take up the arms, they are haunted by these questions at the subconscious level. They understand these sorts of questions instinctively. It comes with having an innate wisdom acquired through centuries on a sub-conscious level either through the medium of folk-lores or stories and myths passed throughout the generations spanning millennia. That is one advantage of not being possessed with bookish knowledge.
When you don’t try to give answer to the basic questions it is clear that Kashmiris will suffer from identity crisis.
As a proof, I have posed the above mentioned questions to Kashmiris and they have mentioned to me in no uncertain terms that they are impressed with the logic of the questions offered above. And they were not overly literate.
But, when I posed the same question to a highly literate person he became embarrassed and began to offer excuses. Therefore, never underestimate the thinking capacity of ordinary Kashmiris. Hence, message should be loud and clear to one and all. In order to claim Kashmir, common masses of Kashmir should have some sort of connection with the ancient Kashmiri festivals. |
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