Sumedha Sharma
Tribune news Service
Gurugram, August 12
The idea of hosting Eid celebrations for over 300 Kashmiri students unable to visit home for the festival backfired on a local social Kashmiri Pandit group, who were subjected to threats and abuses from across the country.
The event, which had Haryana Waqf Board Chairman Dr Hanif Quereshi as chief guest, had an assured guest list of 217 students until the invite of the event went viral on social media last night. Not only were the organisers, whose contact numbers were on the invitation card, called anti-Hindu and anti-national, but also most of the universities where the participating students studied allegedly issued "unofficial" advisories asking them to keep away from the event to avoid controversies.
“We Kashmiris here have small close knit group and help these children who come down to city to study in whatever way possible. We knew they would not be able to visit the Valley owing to current conditions. So we decided to hold a small Eid celebration with home-style food for them," said Ajay Pandita, one of the organisers of event. "It was supposed to be simple community party but somehow the card bearing Dr Quereshi’s name reached social media and people from states like Gujarat and Delhi started calling threatening and even abusing us for being anti-Kashmir and anti-national. We were threatened with dire consequences but we chose to carry on with the planned celebration. But only 12 students came in, with majority backing off owing to uproar.”
One of the student invitees had uploaded his invite with an "open to all" tag, which lead to huge uproar with netizens. Though the invite was deleted, the damage was done—several big universities in the outskirts of the city called in their students to "advise" them against attending the gathering.
“Don’t name me, but I just came here because I was missing my mother terribly and have not been able to speak to her properly since days now," said a participant said. "It’s not just this event—we were also asked to keep our celebrations in hostels to a minimum and told to go in groups for namaaz to avoid any trouble with local lads. We have come here to study but ever since Article 370 has been removed and Kashmir has been virtually cut off, we are looked upon with suspicion and are expected to be confine ourselves to our rooms. I want to go back home for some time but it’s not possible for next few weeks.”
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via Today’s News Headlines
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