Dr Etee Bahadur
The Kashmiri Pandits often take pride in referring to their community as Biradari. The term comprises almost all facets of identity. This remained their social milieu for centuries. But with the passage of time Kashmiri Pandits often ponder over the changes that have occurred in the cultural identity their recent generations. Changes are visible in the ways Kashmiri Pandits have identified themselves afresh; changes in the ways in which they have been identified by others. These changes have become louder in the wake of the forced displacement of the community in 1990 and the agonizing aftermath of the exodus the entire community. They reminiscence the drastic changes that have taken place in their homeland.
Sources that depict the traditional social structure of the community are numerous. The community’s journal from Lahore, Moradabad (Safir-i-Kashmir,Urdu monthly), Lucknow, the family trees, manuscripts in Sanskrit/Sharada and Farsi, interviews, biographies, memoirs in Urdu or Farsi language, civil lists and etc. all are among the sources that reflect the society and identity of the community of Kashmiri Pandits.
Vagaries and atrocities of history turned this community of this once reputed Kashmir Hindu kingdom into a minority onwards of the middle of the 14th century A.D. The much less story about them is how as a minority the Kashmiri Pandits managed to survive in highly unfavourable circumstances. How under dire circumstances a minority survives against civilizational onslaught is a saga unparalleled in history. One needs to understand their resilience in times of adversity and the tremendous capacity of adaptability they developed under oppressive conditions. One is amazed to imagine how they could adapt to the Nawabi culture of Lucknow and the Lahore Durbar.
Centuries ago, perhaps during the reign of Shahjahan and Aurangzeb, they departed from their birthplace and went to settle down in Lahore and Lucknow, the cultural cosmopolitans or the centres of political power in those days. Many of them have settled in Punjab and in Rajasthan. Some prominent personalities of the traditional Kashmiri Pandit fraternity of the 19th century like Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru have nostalgically recalled the life and times of the Kashmiri Pandits of the later nineteenth century. It shows that the Pandit Diaspora has played a historic role that was essentially healthy and creative. Any inquisitive student into their history and activities will surely find them quite absorbing in more than one way. The experiences of the second and third generation of Kashmiri Pandits in exile in comparison to their first generation in exile differ in essence. This narrative needs to be recorded precisely and with accuracy so as to bring out the impressions of the actors on the stage of the history of the community. Their identity remains embedded in their day to day activities of life, the chores of life in exile and the reminiscences of the past. It is their every-day story of a life that reflects their identity. These stories reach us either from individuals or through the medium of collective memory.
The term Kashmiriyat coined by its originators speaks of a unique identity and culture held close to their heart by the Kashmiris. They give it much importance in geographical and political terms. Kashmiri Pandits trace their origin in the legend of the creation of Kashmir as recorded in the Nilamatapurana of the sixth or seventh century A.D. The Nilamatapurana gives the story of Kashyapa Rishi making long penance and supplication to Brahma and other gods to help him dry up the huge water body and punish the sea-monster, Jalodbhava, that lived in the lake Satisaras, and troubled the people living in that area. The legend is that Lord Vishnu asked his brother Balabhadra to pierce the surrounding mountains for drain down the lake. Jalobhava refused to emerge out of the lake. With orders from Brahma, Sharika appeared in the form of a bird mayna, picked up the part of Sameer mountain in its beak and dropped it on the sea monster in the lake. This hillock called Sharika Parvata (Kashmiri Hariparbat) is the most prominent shrine destination of Kashmiri Pandits who are ardent devotees of Mother Sharika.
‘Rishi Kashyap brought people from the plains of Bharata to settle down in the desiccated land of Kashmir mandala.’
The most authentic and exhaustive source for the pre-Islamic history of Kashmir is Kalhana’s twelfth-century celebrated Sanskrit chronicle, Rajatarangini. It is considered as the first ever comprehensive historical record of ancient India. The legend commonly accepted by the vast Saraswat community of South India, especially Western Maharashtra and Goa down to Konkan ghats is that their ancestors originated in Kashmir and steadily over the centuries migrated to South India and settled down on the Western Ghats.
In a small 30-page booklet, Prof. K.N.Pandit traced the origin of Sharada-Saraswati legend in Kashmir and established that Saraswati river once flowed from the Madhumati in Gurez sector and joined the Krishna Ganga at a place called Shardi. The river Saraswati has disappeared but Kashmiri Pandit worships Sharada as the incarnation of Saraswati, the goddess of knowledge and wisdom. Their ancestors used to visit the Sharda tirtha after surmounting hazards of a perilous mountain track. The tradition in Banaras Hindu University is that at the time of receiving his degree, the student walks few steps towards the north as obeisance to Saraswati chanting the hymn “Sharada Narda Devi Mukesh data Saraswati”. Prof. Pandit has made efforts to revive the link between the Kashmiri Saraswat Pandits and the Saraswats of South India. He has been participating in the annual world conference of Saraswats and making a presentation. In Pune, where there is a large concentration of exiled Kashmiri Pandits of 1990, an organization led by Ramesh Sheopuri and Jagmohan Kaul works on the subject of reviving ancient links between the two branches of Saraswat Brahmans.
In Kashmir, the Pandits are known as Bhatta which is the corrupted or abbreviated form of Sanskrit Bhattarika meaning the Brahman. Pandit nomenclature is of later period perhaps of later Mughal times. It is a Sanskrit word meaning the erudite or the learned. Since literacy was ingrained in their blood and scholarship was their patent profession, they came to be called Pandits.
Incidentally, in early days of conversion to Islam, the Pandit prefix to a Hindu name changed into Mulla in his Muslim name. We find that most of the Muslim scholars and men of erudition of the early period of conversion invariably adopted the prefix of Mulla. Mulla Naderi said to have translated Rajatarangini from Sanskrit into Farsi, obviously must have been a Sanskrit scholar who later on obtained proficiency in Farsi language.
The Pandits are literate people and they have produced extensive literature in almost all fields of scholarship. However, the only written document recording the genealogical traditions of the Pandits is to be found in their basic meaning something like a family dossier. This copious record in files has been kept by the Pandas (meaning family chroniclers) at Matan in Anantnag district. The bahis (files) contain the record of the clientele (Sk.,Jajman = kmr yesman). The Hindu pilgrim would pay visitation to Matan to offer oblations to their ancestors almost every three years. The yazman has to give Dakshina (cash offer) to the Panda which is why they are often regarded as mean and greedy.
Like the Hindus of Northern India, the Kashmiri Pandits worship Shiva. They belong to a region which has been the cradle of the Shaivite philosophy. Kashmiris also practice veneration of their own community holy men. Their regional culture somewhat distinguishes them from other North Indian Hindu communities. Maybe owing to their universalism being the gift of adherence to Shaivite philosophy, their inoffensive demeanour towards Hindu/Muslim culture did not go well with the non-resilient Hindus of North India except, of course, the Kayastha community. The familiarity of the Kashmir Pandits with the Persian language could be traced back to the sixteenth century. It was during the first decade of the eighteenth century, that the migrants from Kashmir moved to Delhi. Most of the Kashmir Pandits were absorbed into the administrative structure of the Mughal rulers or their nobles. Proficiency in Farsi got the Kashmiri Pandits material wealth and also status in the Mughal court.Education always gave the Kashmiri Pandits a stronghold, be it Sanskrit or Persian lore. Becoming a government functionary and part of the administrative structure under the Mughals gave them some prominence. Educating their boys in Farsi learning now became an economic factor for the Kashmiri Pandit families who had settled in Delhi around the 18th century. Kashmiri Pandit boys in Delhi were sent to maktabs (Islamic schools) where they learnt Farsi language and acquainted themselves with Farsi literature. Muslim teachers called Moulvis or Akhunds were their teachers. Chandra Bhan gives a list of Persian literary and historical works he read and a list of the Hindu scholars in the 17th century and learning Persian poetry from a master (ustad). Many Kashmiri Pandit Farsi versifiers adopted their pen name (takhallus) from Farsi vocabulary. Some of them have left behind Diwans (compilation) of Farsi poems or lyrics (ghazals). This reveals that Kashmiri Pandits had perfected the linguistic and poetic skills of Farsi language as well as the prose writings specimens of which are available to us. Interestingly, Kashmiri Pandits had also acquired the great artistic skill of Farsi calligraphy. Shankar Nath Zutshi (a corruption of Jyotshi), the maternal grandfather of Motilal Nehru, a Kashmiri Pandit of Delhi acquired skill in a form of calligraphy called Shikasta. Abdul Malik Sharar(1860-1926) writes that the Lucknow Kashmiri Pandits, the Muslims and the Kayastha’s had won repute in the art of Farsi calligraphy. Despite this happy mix of Indo Persian connectivity, Kashmiri Pandits never forgot their distinct identity, for Munshi Chandra Bhan ‘Brahman’writes,”I possess the heart of an infidel. Many a time, I carried it to the Kaba, but always brought it back a Brahman”
(The author teaches Development Studies at the Centre for Jawaharlal Nehru Studies , Jamia Millia Islamia New Delhi)
(The views of the author are personal)
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