TRENDING
Reclaiming Azad Jammu Kashmir For Her People
The Evolution of AJK Public Agency
Citizen’s Opinion + Citizen’s Resources
=
Citizen’s Control of Public Policy
The most important aspect of modern-day governance is a consensus...
FEATURED
Understanding the Kashmir Conflict, the international narrative
I've included the following account to give an idea of how skewed international representations of the Princely State of Jammu & Kashmir's are, not least...
India, Pakistan, and “Kashmir” – the Economist explains…!
This is how the Economist explains the "Kashmir" conflict using the colonial label of 'Hindus' and 'Muslims' - these are 'constructed labels' however common-sense...
Meedi Mydi Media “Mo”…!
Meedi Mydi Media "Mo"I scour the pages of friends and foeNight and day, a restless soulI cascade into a virtual hole Betwixt...
Asking the questions, having the discussions!
The Curious Case of Authoritarianism, Digital Media & Pseudoscience
Don't trust everything you read online.
You'll be duped into believing utter tosh. This holds true for Twitter, Facebook...
How Mirpuris were invented by ethnonationalists opposed to Kashmir’s Independence
People everywhere want to learn something about their past. I did too. I was born in the UK. The first member of my direct...
Pakistan’s Article 370 Delusions; the Free State that is not Free!
It’s ‘Azad’ - 'Free'.
"Okay!?" "It's Azad Kashmir!" "Free!"
This is Pakistan’s official stance on 'Azad' Jammu & Kashmir.
But what is Kashmir ‘free’ of?
According to the...
Meedi Mydi Media “Mo”…!
Meedi Mydi Media "Mo"I scour the pages of friends and foeNight and day, a restless soulI cascade into a virtual hole Betwixt...
What’s in a name? A brief look into place names of Azad Kashmir
Unknown (or often untold) stories live on in the names of villages and towns in the Pahari speaking region of divided Jammu & Kashmir....
Are Azad Kashmiris the same people as Valley Kashmiris?
Competing ‘State Identities’ & Ethnic Ambiguities
In the absence of a genuine Pakistani state or nation-state identity what are Azad Kashmiris?
It is at this point...
The Dilemma of ‘A’JK State; trying to understand its cogs and bolts
From Mahmood Ahmed Musafir's search for modern-day governance in 2018 to the Maharajah's dream of a neutral state in 1947. How can we connect...
TOPICAL
Remembering the victims of political oppression in ‘Azad’ Jammu Kashmir
Muhammad Ali Murtaza, an innocent young man was brutally tortured to death by Pakistan's army without any explanation and worse, they tried to cover...
Understanding the Kashmir Conflict, the international narrative
I've included the following account to give an idea of how skewed international representations of the Princely State of Jammu & Kashmir's are, not least...
The Importance of Cultural History; Kashmir – a Fragmented Land
The immediate thoughts which sprung to mind when faced with the word ‘history’ were recollections of sitting in a high school classroom making notes...
MOST COMMENTED
The Curious Case of Authoritarianism, Digital Media & Pseudoscience
Don't trust everything you read online.
You'll be duped into believing utter tosh. This holds true for Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Had it not been for authoritarianism and control freaks, these spaces would have been wonderful places to learn...
Ethnic tokenism in electoral politics and the laws of unintended consequences
There was a time when you could walk into any local Labour Party branch meeting in the densely populated Pakistani constituency wards of England, and you would realise that something was breathtakingly afoot. The room would be overcrowded. Almost entirely male-dominated with the usual...
How Mirpuris were invented by ethnonationalists opposed to Kashmir’s Independence
People everywhere want to learn something about their past. I did too. I was born in the UK. The first member of my direct family to come here was my maternal grandad. He was a veteran of the British Indian Army. Terms can be...
Fake News, False Narratives and Identity Politics, Silencing Dissent through Digital Media and Search Engine Manipulation
Digital Media particularly through interactive platforms like Wikipedia and Social Media, are vehicles of disinformation and political propaganda. Whatever the nature of an online conversation, be it a family’s travel vlogs, pictures, fashion tips, food stories - “dad’s visit to Israel” - when a...
The curious case of the anecdote becoming narrative
Internalising the negative perceptions of out-group members is not proof that there’s something inherently wrong with your in-group identity. This has happened to lots of people who have been ‘othered’ through a combination of factors that include inaccurate media portrayals, native informants and unjust social...
Appraising Mirpur’s documented history, the story of Kashmir before and after 1846
Mirpur was the name of an historical settlement in the Princely State of Jammu & Kashmir (1846 – 1947), variably known as Kashmir State, Jammu Kingdom and/or the Dogra Raj. The name Mirpur postdates the principality’s alleged founding in the 1600s. Centuries later, the...
Contextualising prejudice within its social and political settings; explaining why and how Pakistanis demonise Mirpuris
The following post was updated 30 October 2020
https://youtu.be/97IES3jFOg0
There comes a point for members of a community to stand up and be heard. And that time has now come for British Azad Kashmiris, otherwise less popularly known as the Kashmiris, but selectively as the Mirpuris.
For...
Pakistan’s Article 370 Delusions; the Free State that is not Free!
It’s ‘Azad’ - 'Free'.
"Okay!?" "It's Azad Kashmir!" "Free!"
This is Pakistan’s official stance on 'Azad' Jammu & Kashmir.
But what is Kashmir ‘free’ of?
According to the Pakistani state-enforced narrative, Azad Kashmiris are free from Indian tyranny. Women aren’t being raped by Indian soldiers, and by Indian they mean non-Muslim...
Understanding Disinformation and Propaganda on Kashmir
Those who argue that Kashmir is the Valley of Kashmir and that Kashmiris are the ethnic Kashmiris of the Valley are engaged in deliberate disinformation. These sinister interests want you to think that they are making ethnolinguistic claims about the people we call Kashmiris, but...
Whose Kashmir is it? Conflict, Territorial Claims & the Abuse of Myths
As in my earlier post on Israel and competing myths of exclusive origin, Kashmir serves as a good example of national myths and territorial claims. But unlike Israel, Kashmir has a special place for us. It's the place from where our forebears originated, before...
Why do anti-Semites say “Israeli Jews are not real Jews?”
You must have heard the claim that modern-day Israel is a country with another people’s language and religion?
If you haven’t, antisemitism has become so common these days (I’m speaking of hatred against Jews, and not criticism against Israel), that you’ve probably come across multiple...
The Feudalism of the Western Himalaya and Myths of Caste Identities
A couple of weeks ago, I was sitting with some local guys consuming copious amounts of alcohol to the backdrop of a varied playlist, and it dawned upon me that my opposite number were unaware of the caste titles they were fondly using as...
Muslim Ummah Syndrome and Identity Politics
Some years ago, Saudi Arabia proscribed its male citizens from marrying the citizens of four nationalities. Pakistanis were included on this list. The Monarchy had its reasons, no doubt, good or bad; the preponderance of such marriages was given as the primary reason. Apparently, marriages...
The Immigrant Conundrum and Race Relations in the UK
If you buy into far-right rhetoric, the children of immigrants, two, three and even four generations removed are not really British. Outside this nativism - something that is at stark odds with mainstream beliefs, Britain does have a problem with race - just speak...
What are cultural spheres?
The term ‘cultural sphere‘ can be used in different contexts. At the core of the idea is the notion that a culture can be shared between people living in a clearly demarcated territory. There are three ingredients that I would like to explore in this...
What exactly is cultural heritage?
What do we mean by the term ‘cultural heritage’?
For my British Kashmiri readers, I have compiled a series of short posts to educate them about their cultural heritage, as a means of showing them that modern identities have never been around since time immemorial....
What’s in a name? A brief look into place names of Azad Kashmir
Unknown (or often untold) stories live on in the names of villages and towns in the Pahari speaking region of divided Jammu & Kashmir. Variably known as the 'Pahari Ilaqah' of Kashmir, or the 'Pir Panjal' region of Jammu & Kashmir State, this area...
Kashmir’s Occupied Rivers
And here lived, beneath the receding waters of Kashmir, my forebears, once upon a time
As her waters recede and the green grass shimmers in the full glory of the sun
We are taken back to the memories of our ancestors, only just buried...
Protected: Fleeing poverty and becoming poorer; the truth of dispossession
Recently, given my father’s imminent demise, he is terminally ill with leukaemia, I started to ask him about his life in the land of his native birth, erstwhile Jammu, now split between India and Pakistan. I was quite startled about his individual story of...
Who will win the fight against fundamentalism in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir?
Vali Nasr, author of ''Forces of Fortune - the rise of the new Muslim Middle Class and what it will mean for our our world" said,
"The truth is that that the West's best ally against fundamentalism and extremism in Pakistan is not, and never was, that...
