'Kashmir: A tragedy of errors' by Tavleen Singh

The author of the book, Tavleen Singh blames the Congress and NC for failing to recognize the discontent in the local Kashmiri Muslim population of the valley. Although the writer has given a seemingly accurate description of what went wrong with Kashmir, the thing that bothered me is the color in which it seems to paint the pandits.
It talks about Muslims being discriminated at jobs and pundits having all the top jobs. This is a very common misconception, a reasoning that seems natural but in fact flawed nevertheless.

The book also talks about how Indian newspapers hired pandit scribes who were blindly loyal to the Indian establishment and how they were planting false news in the media. Sadly, the writer has not given their names. About how Jagmohan although an honest administrator, was not the best choice as the governor and he was to be blamed for most of the turmoil that followed.
Now when you read the book you would realize that the writer is not biased or anything in fact at times the book is brutal in its analysis of the Kashmiri Muslim psyche. It talks of things, which we as a Kashmiri always knew and it did give the accurate description of conditions in and around the Srinagar city, I can tell you that from personal recollections. I do not know how bad the conditions were in the other towns.
In one of the chapters, the writer gives an account of visiting a small village where the Indian army had allegedly committed a massacre. A youth among the crowd kept on insisting that there were Kashmiri pandits among the men who had committed the act. The writer brushes it aside it as the usual rumor and deliberate propaganda that blinds the actual tragedy of Kashmir.

Buy Kashmir: A tragedy of errors' by Tavleen Singh

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