Mr Modi, take responsibility for demonetisation and deaths in Kashmir

With all due respect and regard to you, sir, I somehow find your expression of views rather equivocal. Jamhuriyat, Insaniyat and Kashmiriyat - pretty rhyming!

Sir, candy-coated terminology means nothing at all when you don't seem to have taken a bite of the reality sandwich. Over 90 killings have taken place this cold callous summer, thousands injured, arrested or blinded.

Insaniyat and jamuriyat were enforced on Kashmiriyat when Yawar Mushtaq from Botengoo, Anantnag, who was killed during forces’ action, and people including relatives weren't allowed to attend the funeral by the government; eventually six people (two women, four men) had to support the weight of Yawar's body to the graveyard.

Sir, you expressed your wish to see children holding books, laptops and cricket bats but what would Insha and hundreds like her do with books and laptops when their eyesight has been snatched? How would you know, sir? You were busy playing drums with the Tanzanian president when Kashmir was burning - and yes - that's not how one shows concern.

Exams are Exams, Election an Election!

Sir, before I express my diverging views on your recent mann ki baat speech, I would like to tell you that mann ki baat is new-fashioned and innovatory.

Sir, it certainly is not heart-to-heart talk, though. If truth be told, it's more like a declaration of imposition of charter by an emperor.

Sir, you pronounced that over 90 per cent students in the Valley appeared for exams - which is true. Based on this fact you argued that this was enough to demonstrate Kashmir is unreservedly normal. Sir, I beg to differ, students only appeared in exams to step up to the next level, they did not sign the petition for the referendum.

Similarly, every time there is an election the turnout is unnecessarily exaggerated. Sir, the smoke and mirrors strategy could hide the wounds, but wouldn't heal them.

Demonetisation

Sir, as we all know the “surgical strike" on black money turned out to be a huge economic and political defeat for the present dispensation, the bigger point is - who will take the responsibility for over 65 deaths due to demonetisation? Will you?

Sir, how would the entire country go cashless when 70 per cent of the total population lives in villages and 40 per cent people have never seen a bank, and don't have bank accounts. How would plastic money and Digital India serve the purpose of a Kashmiri like me when in this day and age we were deprived of the internet for over 133 days, except for sprinkling broadband connections that were working? Prepaid mobile internet remains suspended.

Let’s let water the flow!

These days we hear about the Indus Water Treaty and your wish to ban it. Sir, before you plan to interdict the water flowing towards Pakistan, I would like to make a few points

God did not create boundaries and frontiers sir, we humans did. To let the water stream naturally would be sagacious. Though Indus flows from China, China has been kept out of the Treaty. If China stops flow of Indus, it will exert influence on both India and Pakistan.

Let's not forget Pakistan and China are good friends.

Stopping the water will have various environmental effects, it will change the aquatic ecosystems and disturb the ecological balance.

It will also trigger seismic activity because of the physical change incurred.

Our (Kashmir) population in Pakistan Administered Kashmir will suffer, they are our people, our brothers and sisters living on the other side of the fence.

Sir, Kashmirs have invariably, on all occasions wanted both countries to merrily accept each other's existence as good neighbours owing to the fact that we have been the worst sufferers of the hostility between India and Pakistan and would be the instantaneous beneficiaries of the state of mutual trust and support between the two countries.

People advocating for war don't realise that we wouldn't be showered with flowers in return. It's imbecile to say - cool, let two million people die! Nuclear weapons can destroy cities, blow everything to pieces, cause a number of potentially fatal diseases including cancer, they deform people with excessive heat. Yes, I object to being destroyed and killed - want to call me egocentric for that? I don't mind.

If Iran and America, Pakistan and Russia, East Germany and West Germany, America and Cuba, could be friends, why can't India and Pakistan? Segregating the cause of the problem doesn't serve the purpose, a relevant dialogue process is the only way forward.

I have a favour to ask. Sir, the next time you plan demonetisation, please stand in the queue for Mataji.

Yours sincerely,

Sara Hayat Shah

Also read: Kashmiri students showed ultimate courage by taking Board exams