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We are Pakistanis, says Kashmiri leader Geelani

Srinagar: Hardline separatist leader Syed Ali Shah Geelani on Monday demanded the merger of Jammu and Kashmir with Pakistan, as leaders of the moderate Hurriyat faction spoke about independence and a dialogue over the state.

Addressing a mammoth gathering at the tourist reception centre here, Gillani said there was “no solution to the Kashmir issue other than merger with Pakistan”.

More here

What was so special about India’s 62nd Independence day?

Well, nothing much as usual. But very few amongst us noticed that something significant happened on that day in the valley of Kashmir, though not something new.

Indian Flag was hoisted by CRPF at Lal Chowk in Srinagar on the morning of 15th August, but hours after that it was replaced by Pakistani (Islamic) Flags??

Can you or I being citizens of India tolerate this???

Lal Chowk in the morning

Lal Chowk in the afternoon

I was just wondering that whose actually protesting in Kashmir, whose talking about human right violations and whose opposing the land transfer. Is the Government of India, again bowing down and appeasing people like Yasin Malik and Farooq A Dar, both of whom are killers of numerous innocent people.

I’m now wondering that is the present crisis, a fight between Jammu and Kashmir, Hindus and Muslims or Nationalists and Separatists really?

Below are some facts that speak for themselves, only difference is that the pictures are taken now, and the videos are of the same people taken a few years back..

Part 1 : Farooq Dar alias Bitta Karate

Bitta Karate alias Farooq Dar protesting

Part 2 : Yasin Malik

More to come soon..

by Rashme Sehgal

Thirty-one Kashmiri Pandit families recently returned to the Kashmir valley after more than a decade in exile in Jammu’s camps. Forty thousand Pandit families still live in those camps. But even the lucky few who have been provided government accommodation feel they have returned to a new Kashmir, one that has lost its Kashmiriyat, where Muslim and Hindu view each other with suspicion. A special report from Jammu and Kashmir

Read on

Well, the same lines from Jagmohan’s book ‘My frozen turbelence in Kashmir’ come into my mind

“It has happened before, it’s happening right now, and it will continue to happen.. unless something is done about it”

These lines written more than 15 years ago are true even today, isn’t it. The valley seems to have returned back to the 90’s, the period when being a jehadi was the ultimate passion for youth in kashmir and killing mukhbir’s was the ultimate goal. The period of total anarchy when people were killed and torchered, women were raped, hanged on trees and burnt alive, just because they belonged to a different religion. Youths were killed and shot and their mutilated bodies thrown on the streets. Yes, I’m talking about the same period during which has proved to be a turning point in India’s struggle with terrorism. The soft side of Indian machinery was exposed and it kneeled down before the terrorists.

I’m just trying to correlate the events with the present crisis that’s happening in the state which is the Amarnath land row.

I was just wondering about how there can be so much diversity or I should say imbalance within a small state like Jammu and Kashmir. A part of it is already with Pakistan, they call it Azad Kashmir, we call it Pak Occupied Kashmir (POK). Of course thats not the so called secular part, must be having a 100% muslim majority, with terrorist camps littered everywhere.

Then we come to Indian part of Kashmir, which is again divided into three zones ie. Kashmir, Jammu and Ladakh. All these parts are so called “secular” or are they?

In Kashmir, there are around 99% muslims and less than 1% hindus. The figure changed in the 1990’s when there used to be around 15% hindus in that part of the state. This was preceeded by an era of religious fanaticism in which thousands of Pandit’s were killed and tortured. Anyway’s now we come to Jammu which has a Hindu majority and is called the “City of Temples”. Ladhakh on the other hand has mostly buddhist population.

Now, when I try to look back at things and try to correlate it with the Amarnath Land issue, following things come into my mind :-

• Has Kashmir been actually a truly secular place.. I would say NO, atleast after the time I have seen it. Pandits used to be targetted each and everytime, be it a India Pakistan cricket match or any such thing. And now, in a place which is considered holy by most of the 800 million Hindu’s living in India, it’s hard to even find a piece of land to develop infrastructure. Kashmiri muslims are saying that Indians are trying to make colonies in Kashmir and are comparing it with Palestine. I would like to ask them, if they have been secular at any point of time till now? Just came across a list of temples that were burnt and damaged by the militants or local people since the onset of militancy and even much before that. The list is endless. It can be accessed here  http://www.kashmir-information.com/Atrocities/Temples/
• The second thing is that who is actually opposing this allotment of land. It’s the separatist leaders which are no one but cold-blood murderers. The Indian Government has simply forgotten that. Can you imagine that the Indian govt. kneeled down in front of Yasin Malik and took the land allotment order back. Well, I was going through one of Yasin’s interview some time back, and he still accepts that he has killed scores of people, mostly Kashmiri Pandits, so many that he even can’t remember. The fact that he is still alive and playing his dirty politics is a blot on the Government of India’s face. And we are doing the same with Afzal Guru ! The interview can be accessed here http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=xa9CvVV2HXA&feature=related

References:-

Converted Kashmir by Narendra Sehgal http://www.kashmir-information.com/ConvertedKashmir/index.html

I was a Kashmiri Pandit
I was secular to the core.
I beleived in democracy
I shunned casteism.
Inspite of persecution at all levels.
I never became a terrorist.
I nourished Indian ethos with my blood.
I was a Mukhbir (An Indian Agent) !
I was killed.
PITY THE NATION !

Well, Firefox 3 should be available for download somewhere around next month. It’s great news for internet buffs like me !!

The new version comes along with a large number of improvements, and should be faster as well.

Release candidate 1 is available for download right now, from here.

I’m looking forward to the following improvements in Firefox :-

• Less Memory usage : I reckon sometimes firefox 2 uses a lot of system resources, making the system unstable at times. Though I agree that it’s better than IE, but still there is a lot of scope for improvement.
• Integration of common Add-ons : It would be much better if common add-ons that are used by most of Firefox users are integrated to the core Firefox release as well. I would love to see a whole new download manager being added to Firefox right from get go.
• Another thing that I would ask for would be better management of bookmarks. Some kinda new system that’s intelligent enough to store commonly visited sites and so on.. I can see some part of it in the release notes as well.
• Security would be another aspect that Firefox needs to improve upon. Some changes are needed to protect users against online phishing and unsafe websites.

All in all, still sometime to for the new release

Yes, thats pretty much true.

More than half of Mumbai has been made on re-claimed land, and most of it is below the sea-level. It is believed that by the turn of the century, sea levels globally will increase by a full 1meter. It doesn’t sound much, but when you consider that most of Mumbai is below sea level, the effect is going to be manifold.

As per the Climate change committee of Government of India, Mumbai the vunerability of Mumbai to a 1 meter rise in sea level is very high.

And Mumbai will not be the only city that will be inundated by rising sea levels. Add to this the effect of mass migration from these places.

The solution to this problem won’t be as simple as either. Building engineering structures is one option, but that is costly as well. Rather we should be more centralized on reducing emission of green house gases and reduce the effect of Global Warming.

Further Reading

http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2007/03/28/tech-flood.html

Decided to add a new category ‘Quote-Unquote’.

This category would contain all the random quotes that I like.

When you have a beautiful wife, its easier to tolerate her.

Courtesy: Nandkumar Nair