by A.N. Dhar

Dr. Brij Premi is no more with us today, which is a painful thing for he was a writer of tremendous potential and, at the same time, a man of solid achievement. Death snatched him away from us in the year 1990 when he was 55 years old. A dear friend and colleague of mine in the University of Kashmir, I held him in esteem for his wonderful qualities of head and heart. Human and affectionate to the core, he always kept his cool and spoke words of wisdom as a man of learning whenever the occasion demanded. Temperamentally, he shied away from publicity and was a man of few words. Through my occasional conversations with him I found him widely read and very knowledgeable. He was indeed a gentle colossus-judging him on the basis of his literary achievement and the manuscripts he actually left behind unpublished.

"Dr. Brij Premi is no more with us today, which is a painful thing for he was a writer of tremendous potential and, at the same time, a man of solid achievement. Death snatched him away from us in the year 1990 when he was 55 years old. A dear friend and colleague of mine in the University of Kashmir, I held him in esteem for his wonderful qualities of head and heart. Human and affectionate to the core, he always kept his cool and spoke words of wisdom as a man of learning whenever the occasion demanded.

 Temperamentally, he shied away from publicity and was a man of few words. Through my occasional conversations with him I found him widely read and very knowledgeable. He was indeed a gentle colossus-judging him on the basis of his literary achievement and the manuscripts he actually left behind unpublished."

Dr. Brij Premi shot into prominence and became a celebrity in the Urdu literary world across the Indian subcontinent with the publication of his outstanding book on Sadat Hasan Manto, based on his doctoral thesis on the eminent writer. The volume has been hailed as a land-mark-acclaimed as the best piece of critical writing on the creative work of Manto as a writer of short stories in Urdu.

Dr. Premi Romani has performed the duty of a proud son in bringing out the memorial volume titled "Brij Premi Shaksiyat Aur Fun" that includes numerous critical essays contributed by a host of scholars on Dr. Premi and his work. For accomplishing such a task, he has won accolades from his father's friends, fellow-writers and admirers. Another volume titled "Varaasat" includes, Dr. Premi's two short stories in Kashmiri, three Kashmiri prose essays, his Kashmiri translations of some of Manto's short stories and eight critical estimates of Premi's Kashmir volume“Vechnai” contributed by celebrated Kashmir writers including Akhtar Mohi-ud-Din, Amin Kamil, Moti Lal Saqi and others. For bringing out this volume too, Dr. Romani has been highly praised and felicited by many scholars and writers. On going through the two volumes, I got convinced that Dr. Brij Premi will continue to be remembered as an outstanding scholar of Urdu who would have scaled still further heights if he hadn't died prematurely.

It needs to be mentioned here that Dr. Brij Premi came up as a scholar and writer the hardway. He had to face economic hardships in pursing his educational career. It was long after he secured a first class in M.A. (Urdu) that equipped additionally with a doctoral degree he began his teaching career at an advanced level in the Urdu department of the University of Kashmir. Judging by what Dr. Brij Premi achieved as a writer while he lived and the writings he actually left behind unpublished, there is no doubt that his contribution to scholarship, research and creative writing has been formidable and memorable. So does his son, Dr Premi Romani, deserve kudos for what he has done to glorify the memory of his noble and talented father.

Finally, on going through some of Dr. Premi's writings in Urdu and Kashmiri, I realized what a valuable service he has rendered in writing on Urdu writers in Kashmiri and on Kashmiri writers in Urdu - achieving thereby a cross-fertilization in the realm of letters. I have also been impressed by the flow of his writing in Urdu as well as Kashmiri-I mean the effortless ease with which he writes. And this quality is matched by the lucidity of his style. His use of Kashmiri is specially impressive in as much as he writes with natural ease and keeps to the common Kashmiri idiom, not burdening his writing with words borrowed from Urdu or Persian. I greatly enjoyed reading his Urdu piece, “Main Yahan Rahtaa Huun”. It chows how rooted he is in the Valley of Kashmir, his homeland, and how proud he feels of his rich cultural heritage as a Kashmiri. The other piece that I would like to mention here is "Vada Yus Na Poora Gav". It is a reflective piece of writing that shows Dr. Brij Premi's skill in handling Kashmir prose. Writing the present note has sharpened my desire and curiosity to read more and more of the beloved writer and friend I had the privilege of having as my colleague at the University of Kashmir during more than a decade of the last century.

By A.N. Dhar

On my retirement from the University of Kashmir, I shifted to Jammu in early 1990 as a displaced Kashmiri. Majboor Sahib was a much talked-about poet in Srinagar. Having read just a few of his Kashmiri poems by then, I had somehow felt an urge to see this man of achievement in person. I recall with pleasure my first meeting with him at the University of Jammu on the 25th of October, 1998 when I casually stepped into a hall in one of the buildings on the campus. It happened to be the venue of a two-week workshop of Kashmiri writers sponsored and organised by the Central Institute of Indian Languages, Mysore. The participants were involved in the production of some teaching materials meant for our learners. A chance meeting brought Arjan Dev Ji and me together. Thus began a fruitful friendship between us, which I believe has endured and will grow further, God willing. It was at this memorable meeting that Majboor Sahib gifted to me a copy of his book of poems titled Padyi Samyik (foot-prints of time) that earned him an award from the J&K Academy of Art, Culture and Languages in the year 1994; this volume was adjudged as the "best book in Kashmiri".

Ever since our meeting, with the passage of years, we have got to know each other well through our mutual contact at literary seminars and socio-cultural functions held periodically on various occasions at Jammu. On the basis of what I have by now read of this versatile  writer-poet, critic and translator, well-versed in several languages and literatures-I can say with confidence: "here is a man of achievement in the field of letters". A productive and prolific writer, it is as a Kashmiri poet that he stands pre-eminent.

As a creative writer, Arjan Dev Ji has not only excelled in producing fine Kashmiri lyrics - both short and long - but he has also done reasonably well as a short-story writer in the Kashmiri language. What is also noteworthy about him is his accomplishment as a researcher and critic. He has also earned distinction as a translator, having command over several languages including Kashmiri, Hindi and Urdu besides having a fairly good knowledge of the two classical languages, Persian and Sanskrit. Being conversant with different languages and literatures, it seems he was cut out for attaining proficiency in the area of comparative literature. It is a field which involves a scholar's deep interest in the theory and practice of literary translation from one language into another-across regions and countries. The translator has to be both bilingual and bicultural having command over the two languages involved and at the same time being conversant with the related literatures. Many of Arjan Dev's published papers and articles bear testimony to his aptitude for cross-cultural studies.

With the publication of the book titled Waves in the year 1999, Arjan Dev 'Majboor' shot into prominence across the country, especially in the northern region. A younger scholar and talented English writer from our community, Prof. Arvind Gigoo, had felt attracted towards Majboor Sahib's Kashmiri poems; it was as good friends and neighbours living at Udhampur that the two litterateurs got close to each other and collaborated in a literary undertaking. Gigoo Sahib's English translation of Arjan Dev's Kashmiri lyrics in the first edition of the Waves brought the translator into the limelight and the original poet got an award from the Poet's Foundation, Calcutta in December, 1999. The book immediately caught the attention of scholars and critics; the result was an upsurge in the shape of a large number of favourable review articles in English on the translated poems from writers largely based in Jammu, some living elsewhere in the country and abroad. I myself hailed the book as a landmark: a fine piece of translation. Encouraged by the warm response from discerning readers, Majboor Sahib planned a larger volume of his translated poems in collaboration with the competent translator, Gigoo Sahib who now chose to provide also his seminal note on the theory and practice of literary translation bearing on the work undertaken by him. The enlarged edition has an excellent and illuminative forward from the celebrated writer, Professor TN Raina. I am happy to mention here that in this foreword (to the enlarged volume of the Waves brought out in the year 2000), Prof. Raina has quoted lavishly from my published review on the first volume. Later, a spate of fresh reviews from enthusiastic writers prompted Dr. RL Bhat, writer and social activist to collect the whole critical material on the two editions of the Waves and edit it properly. He brought out an anthology of critical reviews (on Arjan Dev's poems translated by Prof. Gigoo) under the title Arjan Dev Majboor in January 2003.

From what Prof. TN Raina and Dr RL Bhat have said about Majboor Sahib in their forewords the account they have given of his growth and development as a well-known personality, accomplished in the field of letters, I have every reason to feel elated over my decade-long literary association with the veteran poet and scholar at Jammu. I admire his fortitude, determination and perservance in sustaining his versatile interests as a writer. I am specially impressed by his eagerness to see his creative writing in Kashmiri projected globally through English translation. As a budding scholar and writer in his early years he had to face immense hardships, but he has managed to come up the hard way-which has been the mark of many ambitious men who rose to eminence. Even in his eighties now, Arjan Dev leaves nothing undone to see that he maintains the tempo of his writing despite his physical handicap in wearing a collar round his stiff neck. Author of a large number of books and a man of significant achievement as a writer, he is every inch a gentleman, exuding affection, having all the humility of a genuine scholar. In view of these qualities, he continues to be a source of inspiration to his friends and admirers. May he live long!

By Dr. A.N. Dhar

THE author of the volume under review, Prof. Arvind Gigoo, has made a gentle impact as a talented writer during the past decade or so--through his competent English translations of some select Kashmiri verse (drawn from the works of a few noted poets) and also through his own poetic compositions published in several leading journals of the country. At present he is working on a project related to the critical evaluation of Kashmiri short fiction.

With the publication of the book titled The Ugly Kashmiri (Cameos in exile), which I view as a tour de force, the author has emerged as a forceful and persuasive writer, in fact a fine literary artist in the making. He deserves a word of praise for his technical accomplishment: the literary feat that he has performed in conveying what he wants to say about the Kashmir imbroglio and the resultant turmoil in the Valley through the short pieces of writing he calls 'cameos'. The technique he has adopted speaks of his originality, that has suddenly made him into an innovative writer. That he is deeply and widely read, aware of the great masters of irony, satire and wit from among the British and continental writers (both  classical and modern), becomes immediately evident to the perceptive reader. The thoughtfully chosen title of the book (which, I am afraid, could mislead or alienate some readers) and the sprinkling of apt quotations on the two fly leaves of the book bear testimony to the author's scholarship and sensitiveness as a writer. The 180 'cameos' if clustered together, would have just made up a small booklet, but in terms of their desntiy of content - each cameo packed with different shades of meaning - they speak volumes. As a chronicler of events and a critic of the socio-political scene he is concerned with, the author is outstanding in his craft. His acute observations on the various dimensions of the Kashmir problem are very revealing, making the reader reflect and introspect if he is a Kashmiri in "exile"; those not displaced from the Valley I believe, will also look 'within' if they go through the 'cameos'. These terse pieces remind me of the Jew of Malta's "infinite riches in a title" - the phrase Marlowe employs in his play to describe the protagonist's fabulous wealth stored in his room.

Prof. Gigoo has a mind of his own - a fact that is pervasively reflected in the 'cameos'. He has naturally acquired an English prose style of his own too, evident from his excellent preface to the work in question. It is a fine piece of prose, crisp and immaculate. The author lays bare his heart, conveying his anger, anguish and disillusionment over the events that took place in Jammu and Kashmir with the outbreak of militancy in the Valley, and over the inevitable exodus of the Pandits. A discerning reader can see that he is unbiased in that he doesn't blame any section of the inhabitants of the Valley outright, Hindus or Muslims. At this point I should like to quote these lines from the author's preface:

"I have never had any political commitment and religious conviction. I go on changing my opinions. I dangle between an idea and its opposite. I am sure about my doubts, vacillations and uncertainties. I have  no answers and solutions to offer".

The last two lines of the excerpt from the 'preface' quoted above remind me of what the English poet John Keats has said about the 'negative capability' of Shakespeare as a dramatist, through which he had achieved self-effacement in his works. Keats defines the quality of self-effacement as "--the ability to remain in uncertainties and doubts without any irritable reaching after facts". To my mind - I have no hesitation in saying so - the author has largely succeeded in achieving self-effacement through the 'cameos' he has hit upon. He is 'invisible' throughout - an 'outsider'.

Through the 'cameos' the author points his finger at what ails the collective psyche of the Kashmiris as a whole. He has no malice or ill-will against anyone and has no axe to grind in painting the Kashmiris 'ugly'. He feels rooted in the Valley; hence his anguish and disgust. He targets everything unpleasant and doesn't spare himself in the last 'cameos'. As a neutral omniscient observer, he uses the 'cameos' as a medium for unburdening his heavy heart - the mental agony and suffering he has experienced in the Valley and later as a 'migrant' in Jammu. He is brutally frank too in conveying bitter and unpalatable things. While he points his finger at what pains and annoys him, he provides the healing touch of the physician too - in making the Kashmiri reader, Muslim or Pandit, to think hard and to introspect why things have gone wrong and how they could be remedied.

In some of the 'cameos' the author targets the Central Government for having bungled the Kashmir issue right from the start. The reader doesn't find it difficult to identify the eminent personalities-political leaders and rulers-on whom aspersions are cast in this regard. As an imaginative writer, he makes statements (in the 'cameos') involving the interplay of wit and humour, irony and sarcasm, or paradoxes, ambiguities, innuendos, playing on words and the oblique manner of the English Metaphysicals to achieve his effects. Though the common reader can catch the general drift of the 'cameos', at many places he or she may get bogged down too - some 'cameos' seem nerve-racking as puzzles. The author will do well to provide helpful notes and clues in the form of an 'appendix' to the book.

Some specimens of the 'cameos' are given below to give the reader (of the present review) and idea of how the author employs them as his instruments:

Still

I still am; I am not still.

(The author probably has a displaced Pandit in his mind)

**

Strength

Divided we stand; united we fall.

(Applies again to the Pandits)

**

Aspirations

"What are your demands?"

"Only money and independence from you".

(This seems an aspersion on those Kashmiris who talk of freedom)

**

The Slip

The old man saw "a ray of hope;"

his lieutenant said "those unfortunate people"; the bald bachelor felt the 'ground slippery'.

(The old man can easily be identified as Mahatma Gandhi and his lieutenant as Nehru. Sardar Patel could be the third man who "felt the ground slippery")

He wasn't a bachelor.

**

Gulmarg and After

The dreamer closed his eyes when

the lion was caged; his daughter

opened hers when the cub roared;

and the young grandson played

in snow.

(Clues: The dreamer is Nehru and the grandson Rajiv Gandhi. The 'lion' and the 'cub' can easily be figured out).

**

"Nursing Orderly"

"Sir, the whole populace is on the road"

"Is it a welcome?"

"No sir, it is the beginning of a farewell"

(Clue: This obviously concerns Jagmohan's second term as J&K Governor)

**

Introduction

"Please introduce yourself".

"I am my own ancestor".

(Probably reference to earlier migrations in history)

**

What Now?

"See you in Panun Kashmir".

(Kashmiri Pandits' disillusionment with the movement)

I congratulate the author heartily on his brilliant success in producing something that is original and novel. However, in view of its novelty and the inherent difficulties of a number of 'cameos', the book may not find favour with all sections 
of readers.

The book is welcome in view of its rich content. I must compliment the Allied Publishers, New Delhi, on having brought out a shapely volume with an attractive get-up.

The cover-design by the author himself is another feather in his cap.

By  A.N. Dhar

A Kashmiri displaced from the Valley as a physician, Dr. Roshan Saraf didn’t take long here in being seen as a talented person, precisely as a man of letters. An artist by taste and temperament, he has a melodious voice, sings tunefully and composes verses both in Kashmiri and English. Just a few years back, he brought out his book of Kashmiri lyrics under the title Lola Osh and thus carved for himself a place among the contemporary Kashmiri poets. Now he has made his debut as a thoughtful writer of English verse with the publication of his book titled Rythmic Verses, that is being released at this function. In my view the book in question is welcome as a creative piece - attempted by an Indian aspirant writing in English. There is evidence in its contents of the author’s promise and potential accompanied by actual accomplishment. Before I go into the contents of the volume, I should like to caution the prospective readers not to expect rounded perfection and formal finish from a writer who has something original to convey in English as a second language and so chooses to forge his own instruments of communication under an inward compulsion. He has obviously not had any standard classic models in view.

Dr. Roshan Saraf has a sane and balanced outlook on life. He has a mind of his own; he presents his point of view on men and matters, and on situations- in fact on whatever happens around him in his day-to-day life. Rooted emotionally in his native Valley, he is aware of his rich cultural heritage as a Kashmiri and cherishes the age-old values associated with it. Nostalgic and anguished no doubt, all that he says is free from any rancour or bitterness. This is clearly reflected in the seventy-two pieces of written composition he prefers to call rhythmic verses rather than poems. He has written on a wide variety of topics; the titles of the individual poems are thoughtfully conceived and appropriately worded. As I have noticed, several titles occurring sequentially or otherwise have a thematic connection and can thus, as such, be studied as a group. As we discern this connection, we can list the broad themes touched upon in the volume. A major theme is that of the displacement of the Pandits from the Valley, the pain and agony it has caused them - what is forcefully articulated in some of the pieces.

I would now turn to a few poems and quote select lines from them for illustrative support to some of the observations I have made on the contents of the book. I find the poems titled ‘ Home sweet Home’, ‘Rustic Valley’and ‘Retirement’ thematically related. The poet conveys his deep sense of pain in these lines from ‘Home Sweet Home’.

The Rome I built brick by brick was smashed and

dashed bit by bit,

within a jiffy carved nest dismantled and rubbled by

rough ruffians in a felonious fit.

*           *           *           *

There was a sudden drift in behaviour and attitude,/Friends of yore became foes rude, and crude,/love and affection was torn to shreds....

Similar feelings find expression in these line from the poem titled ‘RusticValley’:

There blew a hurricane and erupted a rock

‘Chinar’ turned rusty with a severe shock,

time turned violent and played mock,

the valley saffron became a market of cadaverous merchandise

This is further how the poet bewails the lot of the displaced Kashmiri Govt, employees who had to leave the Valley for fear of life, retire virtually from service and live on ‘relief here as migrants (lines quoted from the poem‘Retirement’:

A dirty tag, a torn flag on his shabby tenement/an ethnic curse crushing every fragment, a native in his own land, labelled a migrant/still in service but Alas! in retirement.

Several poems are obviously religious in content. The poet himself is known to be deeply religious, in fact an ardent devotees of Bhagavaan Gopinath Ji. The very first poem of the volume is titled “His Majesty”. It is wholly devoted to Bhagavanji; the poem is, in fact, a successful portraiture of the Bhagvan as an embodiment of divine qualities, at-once an august, lovable and awe-inspiring figure. This becomes evident from the lines cited below:

An eternal flame erupting from everywhere,

descended from the Heavens to share,

touched this planet to absolve the miseries and to care.

I saw a shining sun with dazzling elegance

glittering on a face in its absolute glory.

*           *           *           *

I saw a fabulous lotus blooming in its excellence/glittering on a face in its absolute glory.

Dr. Saraf has devoted one piece titled “The Frozen Beauty” to the ice-lingam formed naturally in the holy cave of Amarnath.

Here are the lines in which he makes us visualize the upward march of the pilgrims and devotees come from far off places:

Devotees from far and wide

walk the treacherous paths on foot and ride,

pay humble obeisance and bash the pride

*            *           *           *

Saffron-clad devotees chant the hymns of Lord

with mace on their shoulders and head in rhythmic nod

young and old, week and strong on a compassionate prod.

These are the concluding lines of the poem:

“Shiv “ is creator, ultimate destroyer,

he in trinity is the universal saviour

he with “Shakti” is the sagacious governor.

Within the short space of this note, it is not possible for me to discuss, even briefly, the over-all content of the volume in question. What I have noticed on going through the poems is that Dr. Saraf has a fund of English vocabulary at his command including terms drawn from his professional vocabulary. I am sure he writes knowledgeably too when he describes or narrates experiences. What is important, however, is that he should be able to bend language to his needs; when he deviates from normal language use, it must strike us as really creative and not just violating the norms. He has, no doubt, performed a painstaking and praiseworthy job in producing and publishing the present volume. He should not, however, rest on his laurels. A sizeable number of poems contained in the volume are fine and all right. But there is a noticeable unevenness in the volume as far as the over-all quality of the poems or the flow of language is concerned. The author needs to refine his tools and hone his materials. I hope he doesn’t continue to be averse to adopting the free-verse form in vogue today and now onwards 1 believe he will aim at writing clean English as far as possible and desirable.

His book Rhythmic Verses is, of course, welcome.

*(This paper was read out by the author at the book release function in Jammu.)

By A.N. Dhar

THIS short write-up is not meant to serve the purpose of a critical review of the book in question when, within the space of a year only, as many as 23 reviews on it have already appeared in various journals and newspapers published in the country’. They include the latest one by Ravinder Kaul published in the December 2003 issue of the Koshur Samachar(having earlier appeared in the Daily Excelsior,Jammu). What I am going to present briefly is a point of view on an important aspect of the book which, as far as I am aware, has not been specifically discussed or touched upon in any of the reviews so far. My stand-point has somehow a bearing on what the author himself has maintained in response to some of the observations on the book contained in the review that was carried by the Daily Excelsior;Tajnath Dhar rebutted these observations in a subsequent issue of the same daily. Most reviews on the book have been positive and some of them very favourable, including Ravinder Kaul's. A thousand copies of the book, I am told, have been sold within a year of its publication. This indicates that the book has well-nigh turned out to be a best-seller.

During the past 13 years or so much has been written on the subject of militancy in the Valley of Kashmir and the resultant turmoil there. The displacement of our community from the land of our birth, almost en-masse, has been a pervasive theme in a number of literary works produced by our writers in Kashmiri, Hindi and English (prose as well as verse). The recently published work in Hindi titled Sahitya Aur Visthapan: Sandharb Kashmir,authored by the erudite scholar, Prof. Bhushan Lal Kaul, that is focussed on the literary works of Khema Kaul, Rattanlal Shant, Arjandev Majboor, Motilal Kemu and Prem Nath Shad, offers an interesting and intelligent appraisal of their contents. The volume, in fact, examines in depth and detail the displacement of about half a million Kashmiri Pandits, who got uprooted from the Valley.

Prof. Tejnath Dhar's book is a welcome addition to the literature of exile that has steadily grown up in bulk in recent years and is now engaging the attention of many critics and literatures, especially those from among the Kashmiri Pandits. The author is a well-known scholar of English, a researcher of note an expert in English fiction. With the publication of the present book, he had made his debut as a creative writer. Through the literary device of the Diary, he means to present a fictionalised version of the ethnic cleansing of a large number of Kashmiri Pandits and the consequent exodus of the community from Kashmir. The targeting of the minuscule community is seen as a pre-planned conspiracy by the diarist; the fear of the fugitives, especially as it grips their psyche, comes alive in the pages of the Diary. The book immediately reminds us here of another creative volume - the well-known book of poems titled of Men, Militants and Gods authored by Dr KL Chowdhary.

The volume Under the Shadow of Militancy consists of two parts - a short Introduction by the author and the Diary written by the “unknown Kashmiri”. The Diary consists of 67 units; how the author came by it, is explained in some detail in the Introduction. Interspersed with anecdotes and intellectual analyses of happenings, the Diary records how, with the outbreak of militancy, turmoil grew up in the Valley during the initial period (1989-90). The account given broadly tallies with what was reported in the local and national newspapers. The contents of the Diary are, on the whole, readable and absorbing, in spite of the unpleasant and gruesome-happenings recorded. The narrative grips the reader’s attention enlivened as it is by the many anecdotes and some diverting incidents that are not necessarily centered on the theme of militancy.

The Diary lays bare the psyche of the sensitive and thoughtful narrator, who as well performs the role of the protagonist. Till he meets his end, he is haunted by the prospect of his leaving the Valley, his homeland. Yet he is aware throughout of the prevailing ethos of peace between the Kashmiri Muslims and the Pandits. Many nostalgic references are made by the protagonist to the mutual amity that existed traditionally between the two communities in the Valley. Nowhere does the diarist express any bitterness against his Muslim friends, whom he continues to hold in esteem in view of their human and moral qualities.

One important feature of the book that has escaped the critical attention of most reviewers is: the technical device of the author’s distancing himself from the narrative and bringing in the diarist. It is relevant to mention here that the reader is likely to raise questions such as these here: (i) Are the events narrated in the Diary to be taken as true and authentic? (ii) how far has the author succeeded in distancing himself from the events narrated in the Dairy? (iii) does the Dairy pass for a piece of fiction? Yet the reader cannot dispute the fact that the author has succeeded in investing the narrative with an aura of topicality and contemporary relevance. Ravinder Kaul observes in his review of the book that the "Dairy is an important chronicle of its time". In my view, the diarist serves not only as the protagonist but also as the author’s mouthpiece. Significantly, the words of Andre Brook quoted in the Diary seem to specify the author’s own intention of writing about himself both as an individual and as a member of the community he belongs to. He has obviously attempted to distance himself from what is recorded in the Diary and, therefore, it is not fair on the part of a reviewer to question him for what is said about Sheikh Mohammad Abdullah or Bakshi Ghulam Mohammad (based on hearsay). At the same time, the illusion of the author’s being distinct from the diarist has perhaps not been fully sustained. However, in no case can it be maintained that the book is in any way flawed on that account. It is very readable and has sold well as a creative piece and as a "chronicle" or our time.

The sad story of the displaced Kashmiris presented in the fictional garb - a welcome book.

By A.N. Dhar

The book under review "Ugly Kashmiri" written by Arvind Gigoo can hardly be described as a book. For in good measure, every page has ten words. Maximum is fifty words. In each of the words, however, Arvind Gigoo weaves irony and satire. He tries to be artistic and pursues rigorously to create, and suggest a new idea.

In the first place, the title of the book"Ugly Kashmiri" is in itself quite provocative. The author leaves us in no doubt that he wants provocation because it is done on purpose.

As far as ugliness goes we must remember what Jawahar Lal Nehru has said"Kashmiris are fortunate because they live in beautiful land". What effectively Nehru is trying to say that Kashmiris are beautiful because they live in beautiful land. The only problem in Kashmir is ideology. Arvind Gigoo tries hard not to see it.

Sometimes political correctness and ideological blinkers go hand in hand.

Arvind Gigoo cannot be faulted on that score. Political correctness comes with eager to please attitude and ideological blinkers owes its origin to be different. Hence to please and provoke is double edged weapon which the author of "Ugly Kashmiri" employes.

The author also tries hard to be outsider but in the end is an insider who tries to be an outsider.

Arvind Gigoo weaves intellectual energy to surprise and in some measure succeeds to surprise and astonish. The book has its moments but those moments are tarnished by surprising conclusions. Perhaps, Arvind Gigoo has read too much of English literature, where barring exceptions like Shakespeare, wit takes precedence over depth. But underlying theme of Gigoo's cameos is to inject word with depth.

Some of his cameos reveals his depth. For eg. on page no: 90 Shri Bhat "your highness, please get my brothers and sisters back" Zainallabdin "The boon is granted. My descendants will take care of them." But he is quick to balance by this another breezy cameo.

"What is culture"? Tell me something about your culture" "Himm.....I am leaving for Maharashtra.

To trivalize events and tragedies is a weapon which A. Gigoo employees too frequently.

For instance What now? See you in Panun Kashmir.

If Mr. Gigoo tries to weave allegary in the above cameo then he has failed miserably. For in the context of art, author is duty bound not to leave sentence in a suspended animation and leave it to reader to find the meaning.

The golden rule for the wit to succeed is that it should be conveyed as an understatement but here in ugly Kashmiri author tries too hard to succeed in his mission.

To put it differently, Arvind Gigoo tries to turn tragedy into wit. It is here he fails. In any case, to turn tragedy into a laughter channel reveals insensitiveness and any good author must reveal sensitive nature to reveal his worth.

I know my worth says Jean Paul Sartre in his autobiography "Words". To the author's credit words have been arranged to reveal a metaphor but in a figurative sense only. He also weaves events, experiences to project a ideology where author believes in nothing. He tries to comment but is not firm in his convictions that is one grey area of the book.

The author leaves blank space for the cameo "address".

But fails to comment upon who snatched his address. One of the cameos reads as following.

Renaissance "We must preserve our culture" "How?" "By reviving dead rituals".

Here, Arvind Gigoo, much in the manner of Marxists tries hard to look progressive and forward looking. But progress does not mean forgetting one's culture.

Had Kashmiri Pandit forgotten his rituals he could not have remained a one. The author surely knows this. But the purpose of art for the sake of art in underlying theme of Ugly Kashmiri.

If the underlying theme of a need for change from ugliness to beauty runs through the pages of the book, I am afraid that Gigoo reveals a Marxist mindset. The recurring theme of Marxist ideology is change and it has failed. The recurring theme of Islamists is also Islamic change. It too has failed. Pandits cannot hope to forego their rituals else they will not be called Kashmiri Pandits. I hope Mr Gigoo knows this too.

Arvind Gigoo does not spare even Kashmiri Muslims as is revealed in his cameo "clipping" on Page No: 63. It is a telling comment how Muslims associated with national conference issued written statements in the press that henceforth they have nothing to do with party.

Here is how it reads.

This is for the information of all that all the members of our family had lost the balance of mind. The mental disease we suffered continued for 48 years. We were associated with a political party. Actually, we have realized now that we were mentally sick We...children and all....

disassociate ourselves from the party. We apologize. I apologize. We apologize.

Noor Mohammad and family Idgah.

It is these cameos which are redeeming features of the book of cameos.

It is hard to over criticize the book for the author himself leaves us in no doubt that it is provoked people that he is after.