Typical to Kashmir’s unique hospitality, locals at Khanmoh on Srinagar outskirts today served tea and snacks to the security men on polling duty at Astan colony.
There is chill in the misty air as people in twos and threes trickle inside a polling station uphill in a school building along the route leading to centuries’ old abode of saint Sheikh Ali Sirhindi.
The security personnel watch every person entering the polling station to cast vote. Suddenly, a person arrives with a tray full of cups and biscuits. He is not there to cast vote, but to serve the security personnel maintaining vigil.
“How could we watch them shivering in cold? It is a sin,” the man wishing not to be named, said.
An officer with his men is all praise for the man. The officer is having tea and biscuits in the lawn of the school, while some of his men maintain a tight vigil. “It is extremely cold and the tea is no less a succour in this kind of atmosphere,” says the officer insisting not to be named.
After the officer is done with the tea, he insists other of his men to have the tea. At some distance from the polling station, a group of elderly persons is sitting on a shop front. “We ensure no one should face inconvenience or face any kind of trouble in the saint’s land,” a person from the group said.
“After all we are humans. Humanity is what differentiates us from the rest. We Kashmiris have always been humane. And that is what we will be till eternity,” another from the group added.