For the sake of Pahalgam

Two hundred and thirty-six hotels, motels, camping sitesclosed, the Pahalgam Bazar, a virtual beehive this part of the year, withgenuine tourists, hikers, lovers of adventure sports vying for space-to take inthe vivifying air which, the poet tells us, may even revive the dying. Theelaborate horse stand built by a former Governor with much fanfare for thecomfort of dedicated lovers of horsemeat wears a deserted look, the poor beastsperhaps unaware why they must strand unharnessed with not one rider interestedin even in  a joy ride. Yes, the twoweekends I spent at the fabulous resort saw multitudes from Anantnag and evenSrinagar packing up the place, giving it the look of a thriving holiday resort,which Pahalgam really always has been. It looked so unreal, in the event. BySunday evening the place looked as deserted as on Friday, the neighborhoodrevelers of the previous day  leaving fortheir homes, unwilling to be subjected to the prying eyes of the securitypersonnel, who, sad to tell, somehow seem to be in fear of their own shadows.An entrepreneur who had successfully run a novel camping sight for comfortloving yet adventurous visitors, Indian and foreign tourist, for a number ofyears has ruefully had to shut down his operations in Pahalgam. Some queriesfrom yatris too had come in but mainly to check out the novelty of it. Many hadbelieved these to be Yatra-sponsored all-purpose transit camps. The mainPahalgam Bazar makes an even more pathetic showing. The shopworn look of thosebrave enough to open their shutters doesn’t at all seem attractive enough eventhough some of the stuff on display retains its pristine glory. Unfortunately,the Central and State Governments’ obsession with running a perfect Yatra, a15-day routine normally, but extended to a back-breaking nearly two months  to probably make a show of New Delhi’sconcern to pitch up the Yatra as significant a light as say the Kumbha Mela tosome Hindus or even to make the Yatra perhaps look as significant as the traditional Muslim Hajj pilgrimage, afar, far cry. Indeed. At best a replica of that big one. Yet the state of panicbetrayed by the men and women engaged in making the Yatra a success – the Homeand Defense Ministries have burnt midnight oil for weeks to ensure a peacefulpassage of Yatra, The Security Bandobast alone these days deprives the Yatra ofmuch of its religious elan, fervor.

Time was when there was a lot of local (valley) sentimentinvolved in the Yatra. All that seems to belong to the past. The locals as faras possible are discouraged from getting mixed up with pilgrims. And that’s ashame because the Yatra in many ways was a living proof of the secular fabricof the State. Why? Even the Amarnaath cave shrine itself was discovered byMuslim shepherds, the Malik family. I do see a large number of local Muslimslooking forward the possibility of a bit of the traditional Yatra market comingalive to do some business but the dice am afraid is loaded against the locals.

   

And come to think of it the new scale accorded to the Yatraand the attendant brouhaha somehow leave me cold when it comes to think of thefuture of Pahalgam, one of nature’s most bounteous gifts to Kashmir Pahalgam byany stretch of imagination is no Mughal Garden in which the Kashmir capitalSrinagar abounds. Pahalgam is a long stretch of land many miles long blessedalso with great width. Don’t you accuse me being biased for, I do believePahalgam can give a Shimla run. Why even li’l Nainital would pale intoinsignificance, Pahalgam itself may be bowl-like to look at but do take abird’s eye view of the whole place albeit from Aish Muqaam  en route to Amarnath.

It is a virtual home to adventure sports, rich with vasttreks, blessed with glaciers and   amountaineering school or two have come up recently. Yatra or no Yatra Pahalgamhas a multifaceted personality of its own. Yes, the mountains surrounding thevalley too will assure you of that. And for heaven’s sake, for the sake of theholy shrine don’t make Amarnath just a tourist destination. Don’t flyhelicopters to the sanctum sanctorum. We have seen in the past that the iceSiva Lingam itself is threatened by the unwelcome, whirring of the choppersjust above the cave head. The heat generated by the choppers and by thepresence of pilgrims sends temperatures around the cave soaring, causing in theprocess the ice linga, depicting Lord Shiva, to melt away. We have to spareourselves the embarrassment of seeing the ice lingam melting away due externalheat generated by choppers and the bustling Babus and other entourage. Anembarrassment of the kind comes to mind when the Governor of Kashmir, no less,LT Gen. Sinha had to  import bagfuls ofice cubes from a Delhi factory to have a proper Shiv Linga in place for thepilgrims visiting the next day. I don’t know the size of Home Minister AmitShah’s team visiting the shrine in the next few days but do please spare theIce Linga whatever else you may or may not, during your upcoming visit there.

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