TRENDING
Reclaiming Azad Jammu Kashmir For Her People
The Evolution of AJK Public Agency
Citizen’s Opinion + Citizen’s Resources
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Citizen’s Control of Public Policy
The most important aspect of modern-day governance is a consensus...
FEATURED
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...
Imprisoned for 22 years, wrongfully; the fight for justice goes on!
This is a summarised account of my imprisonment in the UK for a crime I did not commit. I was imprisoned for 22 long...
The Solitary Journeyman
The needle has struck, the hour has come,
and the open road unwinds.
With a heavy heart,
I place my soul’s...
Asking the questions, having the discussions!
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...
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...
A Message to Pakistan Occupied Kashmir
Dear Pakistan Occupied Kashmiris
I speak to you through this medium as a brother from Indian Occupied Kashmir. I speak to you for our shared...
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...
Pakistan Has Criminalised Independence for Kashmir According to UN
Preliminary questions to think about…?
How does propaganda work? General Context?
How does propaganda work in Kashmir? Specific Context?
Who benefits from propaganda?
How...
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...
Identity DIS Podcasts
Google Search Results; "Mirpuris"
Twitter Search Results "Mirpuris"
TOPICAL
Learning the difference between Group Identities and Identity Politics
Having been born and raised in the UK, whilst ascribed an ethnic minority status from birth, I discovered that identities are complicated things. Being...
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...
A Message to Pakistan Occupied Kashmir
Dear Pakistan Occupied Kashmiris
I speak to you through this medium as a brother from Indian Occupied Kashmir. I speak to you for our shared...
MOST COMMENTED
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...
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...
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...
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...
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...
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 on 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...
Learning the difference between Group Identities and Identity Politics
Having been born and raised in the UK, whilst ascribed an ethnic minority status from birth, I discovered that identities are complicated things. Being ascribed a group identity is one thing, but not feeling part of it is another thing altogether. We can have...
Nation state fictions and imagining the past
A lot of us confuse our 'countries', and the technical term for what I'm describing is 'nation states', with ideas of historical continuity. We tend to confuse our countries delineated by their map-depicted borders as being the product of a natural timeline that connects...
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 because they almost all entirely rely on a small pool of 'native' actors committed to extolling the history and political priorities...
Race fallacy and social relationships
Steven Garner, author of "Racism, an Introduction" said,
"'Race' is a fiction that we turn into a social reality every day of our lives. It lies at the heart of the complex, historical and multifaceted sets of social relationships to which we attach the label...
A quiet triumph for humanity
Politics and politicians herd us like sheep into a protective ‘national’ net that restricts and exploits us rather than allow us to utilise our strengths.
It has now been nearly three months since my naani (maternal grandmother) reunited with her brother and sister. They were...
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....
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...
The Solitary Journeyman
The needle has struck, the hour has come,
and the open road unwinds.
With a heavy heart,
I place my soul’s keeping
into nature’s lair for the journey ahead.
Of human depredation, her foibles,
her impatience,
I know her...
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 they seem to us today! There is a huge scholarly body of knowledge that demonstrates that before the emergence of...
