J K News Today Commentary
It is no coincidence that schools across the Kashmir Valley opened on Monday, reaffirming faith of young people in education, on the day when the U S President Donald Trump landed in India. He has been flooded by calls from within the influential sections within his own country and others to determine the standards normalcy in Kashmir has achieved since August 5, 2019, when the autonomy of the state of J&K was removed and its statehood done away with. What followed next has made it to the disturbing international headlines, lockdown, shutdown and the clampdown on communications.
Kashmir today showcased exactly what it is – the children of Kashmir want to be part of the competitive world, and they know that education in schools can lead them to the hall of competition and success. This is a demonstrative rebuff to those who have been peddling theories that Kashmiri children have lost the opportunities to get more admissions into the professional institutions, jobs and making it to the higher positions because of the higher level of competition following the collapse of the privilege granting Article 370 and 35 A.
The small and smiling children walking to their schools on Monday also rebuffed those who spread rumours that they were suppressed and had lost interest in the normal life, and they may become stone throwers. This is all wrong. They want to be part of the new world order where their aspirations find wings to land in the dreamland of high success.
Trump who is looking at the crowds that welcomed him, also has pictures of the children going to schools in Kashmir. They are unescorted. They are going on their own, and the same very parents who had excused themselves by not sending them to schools immediately after August 5 last year, are now pushing children to be where they should be – classrooms.
It is not the mere walk up to schools and dusting off of the desks. There is an emergence of a new faith that the things are stable, trouble-free. Parents are assured of the safety of their children, as also that the partial restoration of the internet and mobility in Kashmir, has added to their confidence.
It is a new beginning in Kashmir. The message is clear to the world. Let Trump view it and make the world to hear the changing and positive realities in the Valley.
