My Friends family in Kashmir

[Neil Ozman]

A few years ago a friend of mine was very distressed at the news he received
from Kashmir. It was not very good and I could feel his pain at knowing that
the neighbours in the middle of winter drove his family out of their home.

As some of you may know that the winters can be very cruel in the Northern
parts of Kashmir that winter was no exception, the ground was covered in
snow and bitterly cold winds blew from the upper reaches of the Himalayas.

My friend's family had a liquor store in the small village that visitors on
their way to Leh would stop off at to purchase refreshments. The store was
doing very well and there seemed to be a harmonious atmosphere in the
village between the Hindus and Muslims.

As militancy increased in the region it spread to the small villages, now
all of a sudden tolerance was thrown out of the window, the Muslim majority
wanted to impose there Islamic laws on the minority villagers. This resulted
in my friend's family being told to leave their home because the Muslims
disagreed with having the Liquor shop in the village. At gun point the
family were marched to the door, dressed in their winter clothing and caste
into the cold bitter winds and the ground covered in snow.

My friends' grandmother was one of the victims, aged in her late sixties. No
matter how much the family protested the Muslims were not willing to
compromise. Having let their home and walked for nearly a week to Jammu,
they were exhausted and tired; they had nothing to talk of in their
possession. Grandma was affected by the journey the most and was suffering
from a bad injury to a leg.

Luckily for them they had made it to the hospital. The diagnosis was not
very good, grandma had been badly frost bitten, the doctor advised that she
be operated on. Gangrene was fast spreading the leg needs to be amputated to
save her life.

To this day this kind of activity is talking place in Bharat Mata, where
Hindus are being driven out. There is a sense of hopelessness and despair in
some of the out posts of Kashmir. I also ask this question why is it that
the rest of India seems so preoccupied with helping Muslims and bending over
backwards to accommodate them? What about us? We did not ask the GoI to sell
us to the pigs but it seems more and more like that is what is happening. We
are Hindus and we belong to Bharat Mata, our culture and faith is Vedic not
Islamic. Islam is being forced upon us.