This human problem keeps returning and it will keep doing so unless the issue is resolved, once and for all. In the last few days, the return of Kashmiri Pandits to the land of their ancestors has played out in some gatherings. These offered a changed insight into their thinking while serving as a reminder that they were separated from their roots by the circumstances set up for them by the hostile forces from across the border and executed by some from within.

Fundamentally, there is one issue which the community understands better than others. What Kashmiri Pandits have suffered is understood and felt by them only. The 1990s, synonymous with all the tragedies that befell the community, uprooted from their homes, exodus, and uncertainties of an unknown fate waiting for them, an ordeal now more than three decades old. They also know that “Kashmir is incomplete without them” has also become more of a cliché than an expression of intent in the 1990s.

I am not going into the history of what all happened, though it is extremely difficult to understand the whole of this human problem without recalling the sequence of events on the calendar. That history has also been camouflaged with the black ink of the dark times of the 1990s. That dark chapter was made darker by the forces that exploited the community for their commercial and political gain, while posing as champions of their cause. They amplified their vested interests throwing a wet blanket over their yearnings to return home. These vested interests deliberately avoided the idea of their return, because that would have punctured all their ultra-fictitious narrations. They submerged the victimhood of the community for their politically motivated commercial ventures.The truth needs to be told in truthful terms. No colours........

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