By Suhail Ahmad

In a recently held interaction session organized by Rising Kashmir, academic and author, Dr Nitasha Kaul emphasized on the need of having more and more stories and narratives coming from Kashmir in order to clear the picture of the conflict zone which has been shrouded in the haze of multiple narratives. Fortunately, over the years, a number of young Kashmiri authors have attempted to reflect the true human story of Kashmir, challenging the State-centric discourse.

Walk into a bookstore, and you are drawn to a stack of titles on Kashmir conflict. Though non-Kashmiri writers have authored most of these books, there has been a refreshing change with the residents providing a local perspective of the intractable conflict. Now you can find the likes of Basharat Peer, Mirza Waheed and Shahnaz Bashir alongside Victoria Schofield, Sumantra Bose, Sumit Ganguly and M J Akbar.

The local narrative is important given the prevailing climate of opinion in India about Kashmir. The debate about Kashmir has been conducted primarily by sensational journalism in India. The negative image of Kashmiris among the Indian people receive daily reinforcement from the news media. As a result, to the average Indian newspaper reader, Kashmiris and secessionists have become almost interchangeable terms. In the absence of any contact with real Kashmiris in daily life, many have accepted this kind of image as a substitute. Read more

Source: Rising Kashmir