Kashmiri mothers hunt for lost sons

Parveena Ahangar leads a group of women searching for 10,000 missing husbands and sons.

By Judith Matloff | Contributor to The Christian Science Monitor

from the February 1, 2008 edition

Page 1 of 2

Srinagar, Indian Kashmir - A woman with sad eyes and the bearing of a Roman general leads her bereaved followers up the stone steps of the sacred Makhdoom Sahib shrine to seek blessings for Kashmir's missing men.

Near the relics of the saint, they weep and wail for the return of husbands and sons who have vanished during the 18-year insurgency against Indian rule.

A male worshiper objects as a photographer takes pictures – after all, this is a place of devotion. But Parveena Ahangar barks at the worshiper with the moral authority that only a large middle-aged mother can command.

"We have lost our relatives. We are not here for tourism, sir." She stares him down and barks again. "The world must know how we grieve."

The man slinks away.

Mrs. Ahangar is the champion of families left vulnerable in this conflict. She's also a ferocious oddity in a traditional Muslim culture where a veiled woman's place is in the kitchen. This barely literate housewife has become the globe-trotting face of a campaign to account for what human rights groups claim are 10,000 disappeared men.

Indian security forces, an estimated half a million are in the region, have often responded harshly to the attacks here. Missing men have been snatched from their homes or picked up for just walking near the sites of grenade attacks. Human rights defenders say many have died in Indian jails and have been buried under false names.

Indian authorities dispute the disappearance figure and assert that most of those alleged to be missing slipped into Pakistan for guerrilla training, which has coveted this Muslim-dominated area since partition in 1947.

Whatever the number, the 600 members of the group Ahangar formed in 1994 – the Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons (www.disappearancesinkashmir.org) – have been forced to the margins of this paternalistic society while the fate of their men remains unknown. Most are unskilled women who were jolted into a breadwinning role for which they were not prepared. Many have been forced to beg or give up children to orphanages – and they lack the emotional closure that a burial can bring.

"The disappearances are like a cancer," Ahangar says. "We have been struggling for 18 years without a cure."

To fight back, she organizes regular protests across the valley and provides families with legal advice. On a given day, one can find villagers from remote areas sitting on the floor of her unheated house, sipping salty Kashmiri tea as they go through documents. Ahangar advises them on how to lodge claims and which Islamic charities can school the children.

By keeping the issue alive and building solidarity, members feel relieved of the sense of powerlessness that keeps them up at night.

Page 1 | 2 | Next Page