Once that famous adage was said about Kashmir – Agar firdous baroai zameen asthoo, hume asthoo—, not much of man-made disasters had fallen upon Kashmir. Then, this famous line was said about what nature had provided Kashmir with, be it forests and fauna, greens all over, fresh and pristine water bodies, the simple life, the socializing people and their untouched land. But with time ‘We Kashmiris’ made it a point to finish all our beauties, cut forests, destroy the greens and decimate the water bodies. We all made it a point to see that this famous adage is done away with at the earliest and at its fastest- what we are left with and what we have done to this beautiful place should aptly be labelled as yirvin naav.
Most us will be well aware of what is meant by yirvin naav but those who don’t know about this phrase. It tells about the lackadaisical attitude towards each other as well as the nature and do everything to destroy that. It is a bad and a broad term but apt for the destruction leashed by us on our heaven. And this yirvin naav is not limited to the natural beauty but also to what involves/surrounds us on day to day basis.
Go to any social gathering be it on a happy or a sad note, all of the people in the conversations will be crabbing about the fall in social values, the fall in standards of our integrity, the loss in business, the politics and politicians at their lowest ebb, the deteriorating conditions, the worsening tourism, the uneasiness within and in the surrounds. The happy occasion gets sad and the already sad event gets sadder all the time. People say it is yirvin naav all over.
On most occasions at home or in offices most of us complain about lack of strength, ill health especially aches, knee pains and generalized ill being. That strength which our elders had and would thus work for hours and days without an iota of weakness or pain is a far stretched idea nowadays. Nowadays we may have multitude of food stuff available throughout the year but there is always the chance of it being of low standards and adulterated, compared to the limited but pure stuff that our elders have had. They call it Zoovaas yirvin naav .
Let us get to the city centre Lal Chowk be it near Ghanta Ghar area or the SBI lane and see the engineering feats – foot paths that are torn and worn. The concrete lay out in Ghanta Ghar area is a waste of a huge space in a place that starves for inches. The aesthetics at the city centre is pathetic; it can simply be called as the engineering yirvin naav .
The aesthetics on the famed boulevard is not even worth to see. The most famous road of the city where every tourist who visits Kashmir does go to, is in shambles, the paths dug out or laden with the algae brought out from the lake gives a stinky smell, the bund broken at places courtesy the exquisite lamp posts erected (those never were needed) it is the boulevard yirvin naav .
The traffic yirvin naav has been debated over and over again with reasons cited and solutions offered. But no one till the recent guy at the helm of affairs has managed to bring in some semblance to the traffic system with an all out effort to pin the causes on the roads and on the foot paths. His competence only tells about the incompetence of his predecessors in not bringing this trafficy yirvin naav to the halt.
Go further ahead to the winter capital; the recent unfortunate happenings in this region have showcased the unrest in the minds of a group even when they know that a horrendous crime has been committed by someone within. This has exposed the volatile and voracious campaign by a sick minded lot who are hell bent to divide and create a wedge in communities and regions- regional yirvin naav.
Unluckily this has not stopped at self, community, roads and regions but has gone beyond, to affect our governance as well. The alliance that was never to get together in first place but as the number game demanded so was born the alliance. The alliance may have had very few takers but has survived with nothing to show, of any sought. A high risk taken considering the opposite poles and the result are not that, as were anticipated. As most political pundits reminisce that the poles are still apart, the attempt seems futile as the situation is for anyone to decipher. Political yirvin naav.
And the list goes on and on. I may sound too pessimistic in my write up but this is the truth to which most of you will agree to. We can only hope we somehow manage to break this jinx of yirvin naav to something better and all of us try at our level to do our part.
(Dr Muzafar Maqsood Wani is Consultant Nephrologist, SKIMS, Soura)