Irfan Tramboo
SRINAGAR, Oct 20: Siddhartha Gigoo, novelist, short story writer, today said that Kashmir urgently needs the literary festival like one organised by Kumaon Literary Festival.
Speaking to Excelsior on the sidelines of the two days festival that was held at SKICC in Srinagar, Gigoo said events like this can provide great help.
Siddhartha Gigoo is a novelist, short story writer, anthologist, and filmmaker. In 2015, he won the Commonwealth Short Story Prize for his short story, The Umbrella Man. His stories have been longlisted for Lorian Hemingway Short Story Prize (2018), Royal Society of Literature’s V.S. Pritchett Short Story Prize (2018) including others.
Q: How important are these festivals?
Siddhartha: Quite important. Good things will come out of it. At least there has been an attempt to get people together and that is the bright side of it. And for me, such events become a reason to come and visit Kashmir. The organizers of the Kumaon Literary Festival have dedicated their lives to promoting literature in Kashmir and elsewhere; they want to bring together writers, artists, and musicians. They have been doing this for the past so many years. And, I think Kashmir needed this as there are a lot of youngsters who would love to talk and share their stories.
Q: How is it to be back in Kashmir?
Siddhartha: Over the last 32 years, I must have come here some 8 or 9 times and all visits have been very strange keeping in view the history and what happened. To come here as a tourist and meet people, and talk about things, is strange; you are coming to a place, where you were born and brought up, as a tourist; that is strange. As of now, I am having a moment that is more inward. I am reliving the past while being in Kashmir.
Q: Do you feel such events should be held regularly?
Siddhartha: Yes. This should be a monthly phenomenon because in the last 30 years nothing has really happened. Each city has a literary festival, but Kashmir has none or a festival where young people could come together. This needs to become a part of schools, and universities. We had this in our culture; Kashmiris are talkers, and we love to talk. We talk about everything under the sky, be it politics, or literature; and for that, we need such platforms.
Q: Do you still live in the past?
Siddhartha: As somebody who has seen it, I live with what has happened almost every single day. Recently one more Kashmiri pandit was killed and I remember Dr. Farooq Abdullah’s statement who said that this will not stop; it was so disturbing that I cannot even tell you. Kashmiri pandits are living with that scar waiting for justice; this is a paradoxical situation. I still am optimistic about all of it but every time a Kashmiri pandit or anyone else is killed here, it gets me thinking about what is wrong with the people of this place. All I can say is that for me Kashmir continues to be a disturbing and dangerous place.
Q: You live in Delhi, any plans to return?
Siddhartha: I don’t see any scope for us to come back; because this madness has been going on and every time a Kashmiri pandit is killed, what they are trying to say is just stay out. It is a warning. It is just not about killing a person, there is more to it. When I told my mother that I was going to visit Kashmir for a festival, she abruptly expressed her concern, and there was a context to that concern. I don’t feel like coming back, not like this. Not at all! I need to have a conversation with myself. Maybe I will sit somewhere and that might not even be a conversation, maybe there will be some tears because I can see myself as a fourteen-year-old boy cycling down the boulevard from downtown, but that time, little did I know that a few later this would happen, what happened in 1989, and what happened after that.
Q: Will this event start a trend in Kashmir?
Siddhartha: It should and as I already said that Kashmir needed this, we now need to have these events across the educational institutions because there is a need for telling the stories, and events like these, provide great help in that.
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