Month: August 2021

The Sins of America

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Things have been volatile in our part of the world. Unsettling, as what happened was not conceived well before or rather this only was the peace deal. The Peace deals that started taking shape of some form during the Trump era, without any allies on the table; of all not even India who for last twenty years singlehandedly built almost everything for the Afghan nation- from the roads to schools, to their dams, to even the Parliament- this was never what the Indians were working for and it has shaken the trust the allies had on them. As every other being thought that the Taliban would be given a fight, tall talks of resistance by the afghan forces were given, President Ghani talking about winning the final war against the battles that Taliban has won fled just like the US Army, quietly in the night. Biden talking about the inevitability of Kabul falling, or it not being the rerun of what happened in Vietnam, rather it is the worst what will take shape in the …

The Gun Mountains and Other Gods -V/VII

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On the Road to Baltistan, continuing from Call of the Now- I Life and nothing more- II Road will tell you- III Remember me with a Lotus- IV : ँ : Before we reach Turtuk, Baltistan; it was important to dedicate an essay only to the journey. My travels that saw me traversing through these dangerous, rough and meditative landscapes that over the years helped changing me, even my cells. For many years this road has been my road to inner work and of the outside world, and i imagine one which taught me best how to discern. This National Highway that runs from Srinagar, Kashmir to Leh is called the NH Delta- 1 and is the most important road that joins the valley of Kashmir to Laddakh. La that is ‘a mountain pass’, and ddakh is the ‘King’- this land that is the king of the mountain passes, running along the mighty river Indus, parallel to the most active, volatile border in the world, the Line of Control with Pakistan. Ever since the partition …

Remember me with a Lotus: Memoirs of heaven and birds in Kashmir- IV/VII

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Narayan, do you know why I am here today? I kept my silence. I couldn’t see my father when he died. I wasn’t there. He had stopped me from leaving home but I left regardless and all my life i have been living with this guilt that i couldn’t even gave my hands for his body. I wasn’t there with him when he wanted me most and it had needled me every moment. You know, when he was young, he too came on this yatra, with someone like you, his friend. I remembered his stories of bathing in the coldest waters of Sheshnag.