For over 60 years the dispute over Kashmir has raged on between India, Pakistan, China and the people of Kashmir itself, leading to four wars and a violent armed insurgency in Kashmir Valley. Kashmiri youth suffer the consequences in this struggle for identity. The Western world remains largely uninvolved in spite of Kashmir's potential to be a nuclear flashpoint, caught between...
Let's raise awareness to bring peace to paradise...
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A verdant valley nestled within the towering Himalayan mountain ranges, Kashmir's great natural beauty stunned visitors who once called it "paradise on earth." For over 60 years, however, a violent struggle has raged between Pakistan and India for ownership of the territory. Meanwhile, Kashmiris are disappearing, dying, and crying out for a voice. This is our world. Let's change it.
Maps of Kashmir and its disputed borders
''The fundamental problem is that Kashmir is a place that is seen as of core value to both India and Pakistan, and therefore the Indians will never let it go, and the Pakistanis will never let it go.'' What is the best resolution to this crisis? Fareed Zakaria brings the depth and breadth of his familiarity with geo-political issues to a...
Description: In this powerful segment, Dr. Angana Chatterji speaks of the atrocities she's witnessed in Kashmir, including, ''graves where unmarked, unnamed people lie buried... Ordinary Kashmiris, killed in fake encounters'' and schoolgirls, ''frisked by military forces.'' The presence of over 500,000 Indian soldiers cannot be explained by ''about 700 local militants, which is not a lot.'' Therefore, ''can there be truth...
As a Kashmiri Pundit and a filmmaker, Sanjay Kak speaks of a Kashmiri cause unaffected by religious affiliation. His recent documentary received rare praise among the Kashmiri Muslim community (an unexpected tribute for a Kashmiri Hindu), and a less than welcome reception among the Pandits in Delhi. Here he says that, "sometimes we are all forced to take these obvious positions,"...
Mira Kamdar unravels the knotty issue of Kashmir for us, explaining that it's about territory, not religion. India needs Kashmir to prove its identity as a secular state; Pakistan needs Kashmir to prove its identity as an Islamic one. Meanwhile, Kashmiri people's views ''are only rarely and peripherally taken into account.''
Mira Kamdar, the award-winning author of Planet India, is a...
![If a country is 98% Muslim, ''does that make the demands of self-determination Islamic or religious?'' Is there such a thing as Kashmiri Islam? How is it different from Islam elsewhere? In this penetrating and provocative segment, Sanjay Kak tackles the question of identity, calls for a return to complexity, and says that those who suffer the most, the Kashmiris in refugee camps, ''have quite nuanced understanding of what actually happened to them. The virulence really comes from people who have already migrated...[they] became middle or upper middle class and can afford to harden their positions because they're not at all interested in going back.'' <br><br>Sanjay Kak is an award-winning Kashmiri documentary filmmaker. You can visit his <a href=http://kashmirfilm.wordpress.com/>blog</a> on the making of his latest, <i>Jashn-e-Azadi</i> (How We Celebrate Freedom), a feature length documentary on Kashmir.](http://www.mtv.com/shared/promoimages/desi/videos/ThumbsBatch47/IGT.Change.SanjayKak02M.jpg)
In a remote village of the Lolab Valley, North Kashmir, we meet people recovering from the aftermath of an 'encounter', where militants have been found—and killed—by the Army. Paradise has become imbued with zulm, with injustice... For more on the film How we celebrate freedom see www.jashneazadifilm.com.
Recent clashes between military forces and protesters can only remind us that the civil unrest in this highly militarized region of South Asia is still a very present, daily political and personal matter. Kashmiris, through speeches, sit-ins, hunger strikes, and violent marches in streets have been trying with whatever means they have to vocalize the desperate need for change in Kashmir....
It can be easy to forget that Kashmir, beyond what we see in the news: political upheaval, rioting & loss, is a land with a diverse geography and natural prowess. Rolling, umber mountains dip into fertile green-patchwork valleys where acres and acres of mustard fields can be found blooming in bursts of yellow. Houseboats bob gracefully on Srinagar's Dal lake and...
Born in 1987, Malik Sajad is a Kashmiri photographer, painter, and editorial cartoonist. He is of a generation that has known only occupation and armed militancy. His exquisite photography work captures the joyous tenacity of the Kashmiri people, and the beauty that still blooms amidst rubble and concertina wire. Malik currently attends the Institute of Music and Fine Arts in Srinagar,...
New York, USAZerobridge is a NY-based indie-rock band with Kashmiri roots. The band's lead vocalist, guitarist and songwriter Mubashir ''Din'' Mohi-ud-Din and drummer Mohsin ''Mo'' Mohi-ud-Din are brothers. Greg ''The Quota'' Eckelman, a seasoned NYC bass player (Orange 9 Millimeter, The Phoids), keyboardist Paolo Arao (CatJaw), and guitarist Jay Barclay (Ben Kweller, Damnwells), round out this 5-piece band playing its unique brand of...
Our stake in Kashmir is a very personal one. It's the place of our ancestry and everyone outside our immediate family resides there. For the last twenty years my brother and I have seen first hand the devastating toll the violence has taken on our loved ones, the people, and the entire culture and landscape of the region. Kashmir is one...
Zerobridge takes its name from a bridge in Kashmir, where lead singer Din and his brother Mo (drummer) were born. With Greg on bass, the trio channels the troubled realities of today's global climate with their unpredictable and powerful music. From director Musa Syeed, "Havre de Grace" is the title track off Zerobridge's debut EP. They're playing tonight @ Brooklyn NY...
Our parents thought taking up music was dangerous
A June 2008 fact-finding mission by the People's Tribunal of Kashmir reveals a graveyard in the Baramulla disctrict of Kashmir. The 105 unmarked graves are said to hold roughly 225-250 bodies buried between 1994 and 2003. The Indian police claim the bodies are those of militants killed in violent encounters. The Tribunal, however, believes that a disturbing number are of ordinary,...
Kupwara, Kashmir, is a heavily militarized zone next to a school. A June 2008 fact-finding mission by the People's Tribunal of Kashmir discovered a body wrapped in white plastic, said to be of a 20-25 year old young man, reportedly killed in an encounter in Bamhama village. The disctrict is home to over 258 graves of the unnamed dead, each numbered...
Kashmir - "Still Boy"
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