Letter To Kashmir: Even Now, The Kangri Glows

In this poignant open letter, Savita Ghai revisits recollections of Kashmir—its heat, attractiveness, and indomitable spirit—reflecting at the fresh tragedy in Pahalgam, whilst reaffirming religion within the undying energy of Kashmiriyat.

Dear Kashmir,

I don’t know the way to put in writing this with out my arms shaking.

You have been by no means only a position I lived in, you have been the tale itself. Not a fleeting postcard or a passing bankruptcy, however a dwelling, respiring a part of my lifestyles.  

For over a yr, I drank your tea, shared your bread, and learnt to listen to the track to your silence. You have been smell, soul, and snow. You have been heat in a chilly too deep for language. 

For over a yr, you have been greater than house to me – you have been a spot the place I skilled the best joys of lifestyles and sure, now and then plumbed into some depths of depression too ….

You have been a dream I may just stroll via. You have been the ‘rabab’ I may just play on. You have been poetry I may just contact ….

You taught me to hear silence and in finding that means in rituals – gliding on natural snowflakes, twirling and swaying because the golden chinar leaves softly fell, in shikara rides at the Dal, in paying obeisance at  Shankaracharyaji, in casting a humbled eye over the elegance of the Jhelum and the crystal transparent waters of the Lidder rivers.

I be mindful the sacred crackle of isband seeds within the hearth, stuffed with trust, keeping off the unseen; emerging like a prayer into the air, leaving in the back of that sharp, thick, sacred smoke that felt like coverage, like a mom’s hand brushing over the brow.

I be mindful wintry weather mornings when the chilliness bit via each layer, however within properties, other people clutched their kangris like tiny hearths of hope, sparkling silently and the smoke curling softly underneath pherans. It used to be all the time greater than heat, it used to be a gesture, an providing. A reminder that even within the cruelest chilly, there used to be care, there used to be mild.

I be mindful the heat of houses, the cushy clatter of tea cups, the hush that falls prior to blizzard. 

It wasn’t simply sustenance. 

It used to be belonging.

I be mindful the early morning scents of bread baking. The tandoor alive prior to break of day, the queue of other people out of doors for tsot, kulcha, or a gentle baqerkhani. Bread wasn’t simply meals – it used to be rhythm, group, love in safe to eat shape.

I walked the fairway pastures of the valleys and it felt like wandering via a dream anyone had filmed and left in the back of. The silence there reverberated like a prayer. Horses grazing in sunlit valleys, rivers racing the wind, pine bushes stood like sentinels, mountains status nonetheless like they have been preserving their breath. It used to be all too gorgeous to be actual till it used to be, till I touched it, and knew it might by no means depart me.

The reminiscence of Aishmuqam holds me spellbound even nowadays.

I be mindful the climb as much as the dargah, steep, winding, humbling. The air modified up there. It used to be electrical. Not quiet holiness however uncooked, roaring devotion. You don’t depart Aishmuqam unchanged. You don’t fail to remember the facility that lives and pervades all there.

So after I heard of the dastardly bloodbath in Pahalgam, it used to be as even though these kinds of sacred puts, those cushy, robust items of you, shuddered within me. My center broke no longer just for the lives misplaced however for the silence that will observe in puts that after rang with laughter, music, and prayer.

How can the land of Shaivism, sufi saints and snow-fed rivers be soaked in such grief?

How do I reconcile that reminiscence with the ache of now?

But I be mindful the ones historic but proud, defiant ruins of Martand, stone that survived the entirety like a religious heartbeat anchoring all of the attractiveness and ache it had witnessed. I may just really feel the load of centuries within the stone, and the pull of trust in each step resulting in it at the same time as chaos rages round this elegance. But it certain gave the impression as those very ‘stones’ have been achieving skyward with one of those fierce grace, observing through the years because it broke and reformed throughout them. 

And from close to the ones stones, the sacred trail starts, the Amarnath Yatra. I watched pilgrims stroll with cracked ft and entire hearts, making a song ‘Har Har Mahadev’, preserving onto not anything however religion. That cave, that ice, that silence, such a lot of search it, and in some way it offers again greater than it takes.

And so after I heard concerning the bloodbath in Pahalgam, my center caved in.

This used to be a spot the place other people got here in search of the sacred. A spot the place religion walked via snow and combat. Where attractiveness lived in music and devotion and wind. I don’t know the way to carry this grief. But I know this: your spirit, Kashmir, is more potent than your sorrow.

You are greater than your wounds, Kashmir. You are what endures via them. In this second, my trust used to be no longer a boundary – it used to be a bridge. That is Kashmiriyat. Not a slogan however … a spirit.

The drums will upward push once more at Aishmuqam. The pilgrims will go back to the chants of ‘Har Har Mahadev’. The bread will bake prior to break of day. And the kangri will proceed to glow.

This land has recognized saints, snow, and struggling, and nonetheless, it believes. So I will be able to too.

May the blessings of all who’ve walked your sacred paths information you towards therapeutic. May your Kashmiriyat live longer than each wound.

And I elevate you with me, all the time.

With all my center,

Savita Ghai

(Savita Ghai is former Zonal president, Army Women’s Welfare Association (AWWA). The perspectives expressed within the article are her personal.)