When fear was in the air

From the desolation of the past, life has returned to the Dal Lake. Photo: Amin War

Cruising down a crowded street, lined with shops and thickly sprinkled with pedestrians, two-wheelers and four-wheelers, the motorcyclist braked and took a U-turn. Perched on the pillion, my suitcase across my knees, I enquired – with truly disinterested curiosity, somewhat bored on the ride from the airport by the nondescript urban sprawl of suburban Srinagar – what the matter was. "We’ll take another route, the militants could throw a grenade here," was the matter-of-fact reply.

At once, boredom took flight. Then, one of the "sights" of Srinagar hove into view – a massive dump of sandbags packed in concentric circles several feet high around a green hut with a sentry’s tell-tale barrel poking out. When I finally arrived, wide-eyed, at the home of the friend who had arranged the rather unusual motorcycle pick-up for me, he asked, "Did you see the bunkers?" I realised it was a talking-point for first-time visitors to Srinagar.

In the Valley for work, I had little time for touristy sight-seeing on that first visit in 1996. It is sadly ironic that the "sights" I recall most from that visit were bunkers – the largest was in Anantnag, a square, tiered bunker the size of a house – and the blast-proof police cars that looked like mini armoured vehicles.

In between, I glimpsed the fabled Dal Lake, the rows of chinars – brought to Kashmir from Persia by the Mughals – and the blue-tinged hills beyond. I went to see the Sher-e-Kashmir stadium and stood outside the locked gates before wandering to a souvenir showroom nearby and buying a paper knife with a carved handle of walnut wood. And I halted my taxi once to gaze sadly at a shuttered factory, gray and weatherbeaten, with broken window panes.

At the lake, a small carpet of uncleared hyacinth bobbed gently on the surface. I walked along the bank to where a lone shikara was moored among the hyacinth, its woodwork and seats painted gaudily in red and yellow. But, despite the gaiety of its colours, the boat had an unspeakably desolate air.

There were other grim intrusions signifying those troubled times. Driving along the lake’s bank, my taxi gave way to a convoy of army lorries – each with a helmeted soldier behind a mounted machine gun. On the way to Gupkar Road, a sight-seeing destination because the chief minister resided there, the taxi-driver pointed out another "sight" – the high-walled, barbed-wire-encircled army interrogation centre.

Yet, despite the distasteful "sights", Kashmir’s legendary beauty was never far from sight or mind. If the Dal and the hills that ring Srinagar were bestowed by a divine hand, the intricately stylised gardens and the chinars were gifted by the Mughals – with both combining to fashion the fabled "Paradise on earth."

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