Views are either black or white for most of us. Grey is too complex to accept. Yet, finding shades of grey in a black-and-white image is easier than spotting it amid the colours.
A view of the Pir Panjal mountain range from the window of my room in Srinagar
A verdant valley in Pahalgam, Anantnag district
An overcast noon near Pahalgam, Anantnag district
An evening on the banks of Dal Lake, Srinagar
Even though the Indian side of Kashmir enjoyed relative peace during the period spanning from 1947- 1989, the advent of insurgency, often financed by Pakistan, brought onto its soil a large number of military and paramilitary forces, transforming Kashmir into one of the most militarised areas in the world
Srinagar on the banks of Jhelum river
The last 35 years have seen numerous incidents of violence and human rights violations from the sides of both the militants and the military. A graffiti in Srinagar expresses this fragility of peace in Kashmir
Barbed wires were a common sight at and around public properties in Kashmir. A scene from the Banihal railway station, Ramban district
During my sojourns in Srinagar, I came across several graffiti works expressing the frustration and anger of common people who often felt they were not part of the discussions to resolve the 'Kashmir problem'
A research by the Working Group on Peace, Conflict and Education of Columbia University found that ‘out of the thirty schools randomly selected for the research across the valley, 79% were at a distance of less than 1 km from the nearest military camp/bunker’. The report further claimed that some schools shared a common border with the camps. About 20% of the schools were just 2-3 kilometres from the nearest military camp and the troops partially occupied 1%. Photographed at a school in Pattan, Baramulla district
The psychological effects of conflicts on ordinary citizens, especially children, have been a topic of wide research worldwide. According to a research paper published by Farooq A. Rather in the International Journal of Scientific and Research Publications, the number of patients who visited Srinagar’s lone psychiatric hospital saw an increase of 250-300 per day in 2000 from 6 persons per day in 1990
Most of the boys in one of the institutions I visited were from the Baramulla and Kupwara districts of northern Kashmir, two major centres of armed conflict in the valley. A study in 2012 by the UK-based organisation Save the Children revealed that the estimated number of orphans in Jammu and Kashmir is 2, 14,000 and 37 per cent of them became orphans because of armed conflict
The first image shows two boys I met in the Old City area of Srinagar during an evening walk. The second image shows girls playing cricket at a home in Baramulla district
A view from an orphanage for girls in Baramulla district
Young men playing volleyball near a military camp in Tral, Pulwama district
Women pray outside the Hazratbal Dargah, Srinagar district
Students at a school in Pattan, Baramulla district
Voter turnout has been low in Kashmir Valley since the alleged large-scale rigging of the assembly election in 1987. Separatist groups used to call for the boycott of elections, alleging that the government of India used elections to claim normalcy in the region
An evening in Srinagar
A graffiti in Srinagar
Militants often use ordinary villagers as a human shield to fight their shadow war and this results in a large number of civilian casualties. On the other hand, armed forces in Kashmir enjoy special powers to do search and arrest operations with the help of two draconian laws - the Armed Forces Special Power Act (AFSPA) and the Public Safety Act (PSA) - which have invited wrath from civil society activists across the country for their misuses. Sandwiched between the devil and the sea, ordinary Kashmiris live an uncertain life
Two children and a shepherd dog on a pasture near Pahalgam, Anantnag district
A graffiti painted over a marking by government paramilitary forces in Srinagar
A view from a train near Qazigund, Anantnag district
Grains have been intentionally added to the images to remove glossiness.
In 2014, amid the General Elections in India, I visited Kashmir for a summer internship with an NGO in Srinagar. I had the first glimpses of the uneasiness of life in the Valley while travelling from the Srinagar bus station towards the city centre. It was the fourth consecutive day of a shutdown called by the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, an alliance of social, political and religious organisations pressing for the cause of Kashmir’s separation from India. The shutdown call was in response to the alleged killing of a young man by security forces during a protest march. Meanwhile, the state government clamped a curfew in downtown Srinagar. The main street and its arteries, adorned by Chinar trees on both sides, were empty except for a couple of pedestrians and cyclists. Carrying AK-47s and self-loading rifles, security personnel were patrolling all major junctions on the way to our place of stay...