Friday, March 29, 2024
 
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“Paradise Lost”




By B L Saraf



The enchanting physical and spiritual ambience of Kashmir may have stoked the poetic sense of Emperor , Jehangir to describe it thus: “ If ever there is Paradise on the earth , it is here .” The concept remained within the Royal confines for a long period , till the ingenuity of the Kashmir trader and the government promoted the “ Paradise on Earth “ to the hilt for the economic purposes . However , alongside, the Paradise had to contend with a covetous eye of a neighbour across the LOC who , nefariously , ensured that it does not retain that character unblemished . We leave that part to the other time . Come September floods and the paradise story get a new tale.
Conditions turn upside down.



With a slight improvement in the conditions , the compulsive travellers and the ‘ honey mooning’ couples have started to trickle down to the Kashmir Valley . Of the multiple impressions they carry back , the loss of “ Paradise” is in higher in their minds . They observe , with great pain and anguish , the transformation of paradise into a hell - what the Valley has turned into thanks to the recent floods . They bemoan the plight of the residents who , in nature’s one stroke, got transhipped into a hellish state from a heavenly dwelling . That is our lamentation ,too . But , have we lost the Paradise now , or has the feeling of loss dawned on us too late ? Was it necessary for the September floods to remind us about this loss ? Well, they are the questions posed to none but to us all . We have to find answers to them . It is imperative , if ever we think of regaining our “Paradise .”


English poet , Milton , wrote epic Paradise Lost with the purpose of projecting the dealings of God with the human beings . It is “ about fall of a man .” The scope of the theme is about the universe itself . Such a subject – meaning of evil in the universe – applies to the human race also . Adam and Eve tasted a forbidden fruit and committed a sin , which entailed their expulsion from the Paradise . What would a paradise look like if dignity of its dwellers is violated ? Here ,reference to the epic may not be quite inappropriate , as we ,too ,are the sinners . WE committed the first sin in 1990 , when a caring nurse was sawn to the pieces , a well meaning septuagenarian poet- thinker hanged from the tree with eyes gouged ; religious leaders , the Mirwiaz and a grand mufti of south Kashmir gunned down in cold blood ; hundreds of thousands banished from their homes . A situation got created where death reigned supreme and fear replaced mutual trust . Kashmiris ceased to deserve Paradise when they smothered the rainbow settings and plucked out all flowers from a colourful bouquet and painted the Valley with one dull drab colour . We didn’t honour chastity of the virgins and , in a highly perverted belief , bartered female modesty in lieu of “ freedom fighter’s “ valour to deliver “us “ to the ‘ gods own country .’ Adam was banished from Kashmir in 1990.



We committed the second sin when we mercilessly felled the majestic Chinnar , caused deforestation , vandalised environment and built on the water bodies . The vandilization was condoned in the name of “ freedom struggle .” The process of loss was not sudden . It began in late eighties when the communities , in Kashmir , were made to lose one another in a slow but systematic manner .


A choice has to be made . It must be known of which Kashmir Jehangir waxed eloquent , in a poetic ecstasy . Was it the Kashmir known for its pristine snow-clad mountains , luxurious forests flowing streams of fresh water ( elixir of life ) , lush green meadows , and above all a place where non – discriminating spirituality filled the hearts of every resident . Has that Kashmir been restricted to its present geographic dimensions , or goes beyond Pir Panchal in the south and extends up to Karakorum mountains in the far north . There is a need to demarcate Kashmir , both , in geographical and spiritual terms , and then define it in celestial terms like Paradise etc . The devastation caused by the September floods can be recompensed . But who can salvage us from the self inflicted moral degradation ?




Milton tells us , in the epic , that before their exit from the Paradise , Adam and Eve went to God for His mercy . He ordered angel Michael to open a vision for them which revealed that everything would happen till the “ Great Flood “. Could , then , we take the September flood as “ the Great Flood “ and introspect seriously as to what went wrong with our Paradise , in the hope that things would fall in a proper place for the restoration . Has everything happened that had to happen for us ? But then God’s ways are inscrutable . So are of us Kashmiris , in no less measure . Let us , for a change , allow this time Almighty His way – which , undoubtedly , is Benevolent and Beneficent and do the restoration work Himself . Amen !



(The author is former Principal District & Sessions Judge)



(Opinions expressed in write-ups/articles/Letters are the sole responsibility of the authors and they may not represent the scoopnews.in)


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