There's no denying the fact that traumatic experiences and darn tight conditions in a turmoil stricken, virtual war zone have hit the Kashmiris hard. Especially children and inevitably so. Psychologically, the scenario leaves an indelible mark on a teenager and he becomes acquainted with things he need not be; things far beyond his age. On a normal day, before leaving for school, it is habitual for him to ask his dad (quite inadvertently), “Is there a strike today?” A regular feature of his daily routine is the list of grueling incidents he hears about on local news channels, the radio or elsewhere. Curfew, protests, custodial killings. Ask any tender-aged kid in the valley and he will fully explain to you the meaning of each term. His days are marred by gory tales. Corny as it may sound, but at an age when he is supposed to be playing with friends without caring for the “conditions” around, he has to deal with terms like those mentioned above. Curfews in the daytime and sheer horror at night is his quota.

To an outsider, he might come across as a detached, unaffected observer of the state of affairs who is more interested in going out with friends and having fun. But, his psyche is deeply affected, though he doesn’t show it. And when it comes to incidents such as the ones that have happened over the past couple of years, he shows his dissent. And his way of showing it is: pick up a stone and hurl it with all your might. What else can he do?

A recent incident: a group of boys was playing cricket in a playfield. The “law” enforcers arrived and started beating them ruthlessly. The videos of the incident were circulated throughout the place. Anger piled up inside the meek and tender hearts. You can’t blame them for that. An outsider cannot imagine the humiliation felt when a burly, ridiculous looking man whacks you. I have felt that humiliation. One morning, I leave my house to buy some commodities. As always, I take a short route to the market. On arriving there, a deserted scene greets me. A grocer’s belongings spilled on the road. I am about to turn back, when a jawaan grabs my collar and lashes at me with his gun butt. What I want to ask is, what reactions do the authorities expect from the fuming teenager. The best (and it would be safe to say the only )way he knows: pick up a stone and hurl it at the tormentor with all his might. Though that’s not what I did.

I haven’t had a first-hand experience of the times when the fervor for azaadi was at its peak – the late 1980s, early 1990s. But, tales of those times form our bedtime stories wherein the young martyrs are the heroes and the villains quite obviously are you-know-who.

Growing up in the valley, I have had a few experiences and heard of several such heinous crimes against humanity. A teenager grows up nurturing a sense of being cheated of his right and destiny. Call it political catharsis, emotional purgation or economic disempowerment; the youth of our strife-torn valley is filled with dissent. How does the so-called representative of the masses expect a man to react when he learns that the guy who used to accompany him to the mosque everyday was mercilessly killed? And what’s worse, the poor martyr is labeled as a ‘miscreant’, an ‘anti-social element’. Ridiculous. The subjugation that follows only adds to the fumes which look for vents via a preferred route: protest. The law enforcers always try to choke up the voices of the youth and hence the only ways they can find to give vent to their sufferings remain sloganeering, stone-pelting and the not-so-famous and yet popular Ragda Ragda.
My mother often tells me a story. A pregnant woman went to submit her maternity leave application to the school authorities. On her way back, she learnt that her town was  gripped by the devil – curfew. So, she and a group of people including some women decided to take a short route. On their way, a group of jawaans intercepted them. They were asked to line up and the jawaans started beating them. They hit one of the women but just then a high-ranking officer arrived and told them to go before something bad happened. The pregnant woman in this incident is, by sheer coincidence, my mother and the baby sprouting tiny legs and hands in her womb is writing this. When I hear my mom narrating this, what do you expect me to feel? The very thought of the episode sends shivers down my spine and, honestly, angers me to an unimaginable extent. There are hundreds of untold tales of sorrow that can melt even the hardest heart.

Now that I’m a teen, it's a daily routine to wake up every day to get ready in time for the college and very often going back to sleep again because curfew was declared in the dead of the night. Now that I’m a teen, the voices of my mother imploring me to stay indoors whenever khaki-clad brigades are on the prowl on streets are a regular feature. The aunt who lives next door has to keep shouting her lungs out to keep her 16-year old from joining the furious mobs. Particularly the time for prayers is jitters time for my mother. She sees me off at the door and waits till I come back from the mosque, praying under each breath that I return unscathed. How many mothers in the largest democracy (ahem) in the world have to undergo that sort of frustration? The guys who live along the lane on the other side of the streets wreak havoc every day. Very often in the day, they try to target the important-looking fellas (jawaans) roaming about (God! Everybody is an IGP here) from over rooftops. And very frequently, their stones find the window panes of our house in particular (don’t know why) and other houses in general. You are having dinner with your family when suddenly the mosque loudspeakers are turned on with announcements like “10 boys have been detained by security forces in the adjoining locality. Please come out of your homes.” To hell with the dinner. These are our friends. Let’s go out. And the night passes in suspense and anxiety. The very thought of spending a night in jail is harassing enough. Plus, the hound-like nature of those who detain our brothers is the topping on the cake. The punishment inflicted there rattles the very being of the victim. I can never forget the condition my friend was in when he was let off three days after detention.
The lanes remind me of Auschwitz. The camps of the exposed barracks that held back men, women and children alike and the centres wherein millions were incarcerated and gassed.

Switch on the TV, set your eyes on any news channel; you will hear “Four people killed in clashes between security forces and stone-pelters in Srinagar.” That dampens the heart. That sure does. And what irks us more are the statements issued by the government. “Controlling mob-fury", "self defence", "maximum restraint”. Heartrending tales ignite the urge to carry this to the end. The recent killings in Anantnag are classic examples of the dastardly crimes committed against us. What harm could a 15-year old cause? This is nothing but cold-blooded murder. The youth of Kashmir is fed up of the probes, the investigations that are ordered but never carried out. The fake encounters to win accolades. The high handedness of the troopers. Why aren’t they held responsible for the crimes they commit? And what we want to know is: where to go for the answers? For those sections of society who believe that there is no issue, no dispute worth the name, all we ask is whether they have ever felt the pain we live with every day.

The life of the average Kashmiri youth is marred with horrors. Labeled as an anti-social element for protesting what’s inhumane, for speaking out against suppression. What do we call the freedom fighters of India then? But what they don’t realise is that this kind of crackdown will never silence the youth of Kashmir. This has gone too far. There is no alternative route to peace. What the youth of the state want to say is; We are the future of the society and we will decide its destiny. The hope of the Kashmir of my dreams stands and stands tall.

This first appeared in the July 16-31 issue of the Governance Now magazine (Vol. 01, Issue 12).

Read a related column.