In Greater Kashmir (21st November) Z.G. Mohammad has touched upon an important subject – our historical existence in his wonderful write – up, titled writing History. He has again raised the question of having the Munshi Mohammad Din Fauq Chair in the Kashmir University. He rightly points out that the Kashmir University since 1947 has not been able to produce any researcher of international repute. According to him the factors responsible for it are; one politics that goes in the appointment of a Vice Chancellors, two politicking in the campus and thirdly narrow-mindedness of our academia. I am of this  opinion that we Kashmiri’s are par-daar-ik and prefer to invite non-Kashmiris so that they can ride on us by keep their feet secure in the two side sleeves of our pherons. The question is why are we inviting non-Kashmiri’s to our institutions? Is there no competent professor in the Kashmir University to look after our institutions? The trouble is that seeds of division have been sown by Delhi in our campus so that we go on only fighting between ourselves. Our politicians, who could have looked into this issue of our national importance, are too busy in pursuing their political agendas that they have no time to look into this side of our misfortune.
 From the study of our own history, we could have obtained guidance to see the right way to proceed upon. But our total ignorance of our national history has turned us into dwarfs, searching our roots in gutters. The fact is that the Kashmiri’s are a distinct nation, who shares a common language, culture, ethnicity, descent and history. We do have physical borders, and share a common territory, irrespective of our ethnic makeup. We do have a written history dating back to the Great Flood of Noah, which occurred 76000 years ago. The need is to make ourselves aware of our glorious past, when we ruled over the north India from Anantnag to Mathura. In fact, we built the capital of India at Parihasapura in Kashmir in the 8th century. During the rule of Sultan Shihabuddin (1355-1373) our borders touched Tatha in Sindh (now in Pakistan). 
The world Book Dictionary defines nation as the people occupying the same country united under the government and usually speaking the same language. It also says that nation refer to a people race or tribe, who have the same descents, language or history. Our dearest mentor, Lalla Ded says: Ays aess to assi aaso meaning “we were and we shall be”. Thus, she has asserted our historical identity and individuality. As Kashmiri’s we must try to uphold our national pride, humanism and dignity. A careful and deep study of our history tells us about our historical periods; Hebrew, Greek, Saythian, Buddhist, Shaivist and lastly Islamic, which we have combined and thus originated a composite culture, which is known a Kashmiriyat. The need of the hour is that we get our youth aware of our rich cultural heritage. This could have been done by our University Professors, who only specialize in teaching the British, European and American history! They too are ignorant of Kashmir History we must appreciate the efforts of one scholar, Mr Shabnam Qayoom, who is continuously recording events of Kashmir since 1947 and has published 5 volumes in Urdu, so far under the title of Kashmir of Siyasi Inquilab. 
We are known in history as the Kassites who reached the Valley through Hunza and Gilgit. A peculiarity of these Kassites was that they would name all place, and locations, where they dwelt, after theirs tribal designation Kass. Thus we have Kash-Mer-river in Babylonia Kash-mer town in Iran and Kash-Mor a town in Central Asia. We do have the well-known Kashgar in Central Asia. The leader of the migrants, who came to Kashmir, is also known as Kashyap. 
Munchi Muhammad Din Fauq can be termed as one of our great historian, who wrote about 80 books on Kashmir, including a complete history of Kashmir from ancient times to the rule of the Sikhs (1847). Besides he is the only historian, who wrote two volumes on clans and tribes of Kashmir known as Tarikh-i-Aqwam-i-Kashmir. His independent work on Sultan Zain-ul-abidin is an authentic source material on Budhshah. He also wrote a volume on the great women of Kashmir. Naturally, there should have been a Chair on Munshi Mohammad Din Fauq in the Kashmir University but there may be some mystery as to why it has not been done so far.

(The author is the recipient   of the Life Time Achievement Award from the Government of Jammu & Kashmir and several degrees and awards from various universities in India, Japan, Switzerland, Germany and Mexico, Sufi Mystic,  Professor Fida Hassnain is a noted historian of Kashmir, whose works dealing with history, culture and mysticism have been translated   into Polish, Russian, Italian and Portuguese. Feedback at fidahassnain@myasa.net)

Lastupdate on : Tue, 29 Nov 2011 21:30:00 Makkah time
Lastupdate on : Tue, 29 Nov 2011 18:30:00 GMT
Lastupdate on : Wed, 30 Nov 2011 00:00:00 IST