Published in the Daily Times on March 04, 2007 http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007-3-4\story_4-3-2007_pg3_6

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Briefs VIEW: Kashmir’s two fundamentalisms —Dr Nyla Ali Khan Hasan-Askari
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Editorial In contemporary Kashmiri society the question of the role of season on Pakis
women in the nationalist scenario remains a vexed one. The Hallelujah! —Kh
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only women’s reactionary organisation in Kashmir,
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Dukhtaran-e-Millat, claims that the image of woman as
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vigilante group subscribes to
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The organisation and mobilisation of Muslim collective identities, which fundamentalism
would enable the forging of political and cultural coalitions between Ali Khan
various groups, has become a source of anxiety not just for the gurus of LETTERS:
secular modernity but also for the upholders of an uncritical and ZAHOOR'S CAR
fundamentalist version of Islam.
In politically turbulent areas in India like Kashmir, secular nationalism has
been deployed as a tool just as oppressive as religious fundamentalism by
state-sponsored institutions. In such murky political scenarios, the rhetoric
propounded by secular nationalism does not provide a substantial
corrective to the ideology disseminated by religious fundamentalism.
On the contrary, secular nationalist rhetoric ends up reinforcing a new kind
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of orthodoxy, which not only validates the agendas of right-wing political
and cultural organisations, but also constructs Islam as the exact opposite
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of secular modernity and liberal democracy.
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For example, in contemporary Kashmiri society the question of the role of
women in the nationalist scenario remains a vexed one. The only women’s
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reactionary organisation in Kashmir, Dukhtaran-e-Millat, claims that the
image of woman as a burqa-clad faceless and voiceless cultural icon,
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the versions of religious scriptures that this vigilante group subscribes to
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This vigilante group uses intimidating and questionable tactics to raid
houses that allegedly have been converted into brothels and brutally
censors romantic liaisons between college-going boys and girls. It makes a
facile attempt to reconstruct historical and cultural discourses in order to
inspire the kind of cultural nationalism that fundamentalist politics require.

2. This organisation advocates the creation of a homogeneous culture devoid
of the freedoms that Kashmiri women have traditionally enjoyed. Their
For The Woman draconian methods to enforce purdah, reinforce a patriarchal structure in
of Today which an unaccompanied woman is rendered vulnerable, and curtail the
Be Stock Smart & mobility of the technology-savvy youth is an attempt to Arabise the
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Guide for Women There seems to be an insensitivity in such reactionary organisations as
Equitymaster.com/Investment_Guide in former and current regional and national administrations — such
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as the Congress and People’s Democratic Party coalition government in the
state and the centralising regimes of the Congress, the Bharatiya Janata
Muslim Men Party, and the National Democratic Front in the centre — about the diverse
Marriage interpretations of religious laws regarding the institutions of marriage,
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In its initial years, Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah’s National Conference
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enabled the emergence of a well-educated, politically aware generation of
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Kashmiris. But in the 1970s and the 1980s, Indira Gandhi’s Congress
regime characterised every demand for local empowerment as potentially
insurgent, discouraging the growth of a progressive generation of
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with Photos. The vociferous members of the Dukhtaran-e-Millat would better serve the
Search & Contact female population of the state by campaigning for quotas for women in the
by Email Now. legislative assembly, legislative council, parliament, and the judiciary. An
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would facilitate a cultural shift in terms of gender role expectations,
allowing defiance of the normative structure.
Girl Reproductive In the present scenario, no thought is given either by the state authorities
System or by insurgent groups to women who have been victims of the
Find diagrams and paramilitary forces and/or of militant organisations. Horrifying narratives
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leading doctors in remote villages are absent from the official record, and are fearfully
IndianWomensHealth.com voiced in the atmosphere of paranoia that pervades the Kashmir valley.
For instance, in 1991, more than 800 soldiers of the fourth Rajput
Regiment raped 23-60 women in the course of one night in the village of
Kunan Pohpura in Kashmir.
These soldiers raided the village on the pretext of interrogating the local
men who were allegedly insurgents. Another gruesome incident of a
similar nature occurred in Handawara village in 2004, where a mother and
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her minor daughter were sadistically defiled by a major of the Rashtriya
Search Rifles. In Mattan in South Kashmir, an Indian army subedar and his
bodyguard of 7 Rashtriya Rifles were involved in a spine-chilling rape case
against which the necessary governmental action is yet to be taken.
Women representatives of the ruling People’s Democratic Party and those
of its ally, the Congress, are quick to make visits accompanied by their
entourages to isolated villages or towns in which the Indian army has
trammelled the sensibilities of the female population. The PDP, while in
opposition, raised the issue of human rights abuses which, until then,
hadn’t been given much credence by the National Conference government.
But they have been unable to advocate reforms that are specific to
women. No stringent and timely measures have been taken to redress
those wrongs.
The writer is the grand-daughter of Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah