Marwah™
Marwah™
Jul 23, 2017 · 3 min read

I’m a Student and I resist
“O enemy, see my defiance, realise you were never meant to be here. If we wanted you to sojourn, you would know. But you see, we’ve never bowed down”
I live in Indian-occupied Kashmir and everything that’s been going on since the last few months has not only affected us all. It has somewhat enthused us. The students out there in the streets are not only angry, they’re dejected. We have seen atrocities since we were born, we’ve always experienced subjugation. The events that we’ve been through developed us, molded us into rebels. We knew the difference between a bullet and a teargas when we couldn’t even tell a bat from a ball. It’s unfortunate, yes. But it is the truth.
I, as a student have a certain aim. I want to do something in my life that will be worth my while and something that’ll help me do my parents proud. But as a Kashmiri, I feel like I’m limited. I want to become a writer one day. But whenever I write a piece, I’m afraid someone might send me to jail over it, for I might not have written ‘appropriate’ content or I might’ve written something that questions my ‘devotion’ to India. (Censorship is cowardly, y’all) You see, the term ‘freedom of expression’ is nothing but a fib to us, Kashmiris.
And if I do ever become a writer, my write-ups will always reflect the pain I’ve been through and the agony my fellow Kashmiris have experienced. Even if I write about unicorns and rainbows, there’ll be that tinge of sorrow in it. And it’ll be because I (like all the Kashmiris) have seen a lot that I can’t forget.
“I’m livid, but I haven’t lost my calm. I’m dismal, but I haven’t given up. I’m in desolation, but I haven’t lost hope.”
During the curfew last year, I’d kept this journal in which I jotted down my ‘feelings’ about the scenario then. I kept writing everyday for a month and then one day, my dad saw the diary. He chewed me out for being silly enough to write against the Indian army. He went, “You have no idea what you’re doing. You must be feeling very brave by writing all this crap, huh? What if one of the army men saw this? Do you know what would happen then?” I was like, “yes, I know absolutely what would happen but then, most of the army men are illiterate so what gives?” At that, he slapped me. And it was the first time my father had done that. Heartbroken, I went to my room and cried my eyes out. The next morning when I woke up, I couldn’t find my journal. Dad had burned it.
After a few days or so, I heard about this man who’d been killed because he had a photo of Burhan Wani in his cell phone. (And at that moment, I was kind of relieved that my dad destroyed my journal)
“You are the brood of mêlée.” My Canadian friend, Adrian once said to me. And she was so right.
I believe we, students are on the roads instead of our classrooms mainly because we’ve awakened. We’ve finally taken charge. We don’t want to lose any more innocent blood to the conflict. I mean, we’d rather go have fun at parties or traveling the world or doing things that we wanted to do in the first place. We’d do the things ‘normal’ youth enjoy doing but for now, that’s immaterial. The only thing we want is normalcy. We want to be happy and most of all, free.
I feel like our lives have become like this quote from Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird ..

Like “Shoot all the bluejays* you want, if you can hit ‘em, but remember it’s a sin to kill a mockingbird.**”
* Kashmiri ** Anyone who’s NOT a Kashmiri.
Concluding, let’s realise that the message is clearer than ever. The millennial gen are here to snatch their freedom back.