A year since Burhan Wani

BURHAN Wani needs to no introduction. He was a young handsome boy    who used social media  with a narcissist's  passion,  unafraid  of anything for he believed too much in his support in public.  He has left a legacy: youth joining militancy  and social media being used as a powerful weapon to start new narratives to humble the Indian state in the cyber world. This phenomenon,  after the death of Burhan  on July 8 last year, tends to make him another legend. It is both a homegrown sentiment as also a deliberately cultivated narrative  to challenge the existing  ways of militancy  and  security apparatus.

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In the year that followed his death,  everything is being attributed to Wani’s charisma. The violent mobs thronging encounter sites are credited to Burhan but this is not true. This process had started long before  his death. Street protestors facing bullets and pellets too is not a post-Burhan development, but the narrative has been  distorted in his favour.  The crowds have become more fearless and the appeal for violence and militancy has grown is attributable to his death and the romance of  “martyrdom” generated in the first few weeks of Wani’s death on July 8, 2016.

The eruption of violent protests in south Kashmir  immediately after his death and the  subsequent killings in the Valley, have been shown as an after- effect of the “martyrdom” of   Burhan.   That  is not the whole truth but any one questioning  his personality and the built-up aura around him, is considered as an  enemy of the “movement.” A deep fatigue has set in  among Kashmiris. They have suffered so many losses in terms of human lives, more than 150 dead  and hundreds others injured, and the economy too has suffered incalculable damage. Things have come to such a pass that the residents of Tral working elsewhere in the Valley say they love Burhan but  they have to “fill their stomachs and look after their families.” And they qualify, “Burhan was from a well-off family, (his father is the Principal of a high school), we are not.” The difference in class is also becoming clear.

Those very residents who had woven a folklore about Burhan, claim that he had told his teacher, “Some day I will do something which will usher in inquilab ( revolution)”  and that's what  happened with his death when thousands offered funeral prayers and the south Kashmir erupted with violent  protests. That Burhan was “unarmed” at the time of the encounter, was another thesis peddled. “He was on his way to meet Amarnath pilgrims to assure them of their security and safety,” is yet another version  explaining his location at Kokkernag, in deep south Kashmir. Some sections in the government  believe that Burhan was a deliberately promoted phenomenon  to marginalise the existing militant leadership  on either side of the LoC, to grant him an image and aura so that he could be talked to in the near future. Who was behind him? They are not sure.  But he was shown in a video capturing moments taller than he was, surrounded by macho-image building weapons and a tome of  authority. A robust image was conferred on him and with a purpose.  

The existing leadership had shown its weaknesses  and the young men did not trust them. The  era  of  senior separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani as the sole custodian  of the movement of protests was on the  decline. There were times in 2010 unrest when youngsters would  bare their chests and threaten any one  challenging Syed Ali Shah Geelani  with a shout, “You can say anything to me, but not to Geelani Sahib. I can take a bullet for him on my chest.” That era was fading. After the arrival  of Burhan on the scene and social media with his messages of setting up of the Caliphate  in Kashmir, and his stern talk about government designs and call to the policemen to  join him, things started moving in a different direction. There was no need for him to issue statements to the media to  sell his philosophy  of rebellion in newer ways. The younger generation was already  connected to the social media  and he took advantage of it. Romanticism and fantasy were as it were drawn straight from the Arabian Nights. “Many of them  had  his picture as the wallpaper on smart phones,” observes Manzoor Ahmad, a  middle-aged man from Pulwama  in south Kashmir.  He had obliterated all the heroes of the movement, and  that's what made the race keener to own him after his death; from Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif of Pakistan  to Jamat-ud--Dawa  chief Hafiz Saeed and  Geelani.  

Nawaz Sharif  hailed him as a “young leader of Kashmir,” thus tearing off the target of  terrorist from him. Hafiz  Saeed claimed that Burhan  had said that he was “confident  of accomplishing his mission after talking to me.” Geelani made a similar claim. That is how the young militant leader was adopted. It was only after they saw that how the Valley had erupted and all the deaths were attributed to the love of the masses for  Burhan, though that is debatable.  There were protests but it was the mishandling of the situation that resulted in casualties. A twisted narrative was conjured up as if the whole Valley was in flames because of Burhan.  What made matters worse was the use of the pellet guns and blinding of the young protestors. That infuriated the masses. The gainer was Burhan. 

The administration, caught in its own dilemma, fuelled the crisis. It was unable to take action against the agent provocateurs because the politicians wanted to  save their political constituencies. The PDP has its support base in south Kashmir. At the moment,  a common refrain in Kashmir is “enough is enough.” The people are sick of violence  and  almost daily shutdowns. That's why the joint “resistance leadership” — Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik — stopped issuing the protest calendars  since  January this year. This frustrating experience has made the protest calls  weak, though the occasional violence, protests and killings tend to  present a replay of the 2016 protests but that is not happening. 

Three top militants Sabzar Bhat, Junaid Mattoo and Bashir Wani were killed one after another — there were few protests. Only a sense of paralysing  fatigue has gripped the people of the Valley. For the separatists, Burhan is a   straw for their survival.  

ajoshi57@gmail.com