My life as an agent

Fifth column

Last week was incredibly hectic. I had to negotiate a barrage of personal abuse and accusations that variously blamed me to be working for Pakistan or India. While some Facebook warriors from Azad Jammu and Kashmir called me a Pakistani agent, a bunch of troopers affiliated with a Srinagar-based political party accused me of doing the bidding for India.  

A couple of weeks back, when I wrote in this column a not-so-flattering assessment of Imran Khan’s toxic political demeanours, several messages accused me of being a ‘patwari’ or a ‘PML-N agent’. That was light banter compared to the current onslaught.

It all started with a Facebook post about a Kashmiri pro-freedom politician who has been sidelined by circumstances for want of political capabilities or acumen. In the past, there has been quite some public outrage for he built a nice hotel in Pahalgam, a prime tourist place which usually remains a preserve of industrialists or historically wealthy families. The cause for the public outrage remains genuine since the person in question does not have any gainful vocation to afford a hotel at one of the most expensive places in the Indian-occupied Kashmir.

My post was about a recent corruption scandal and it was provoked by reports from Srinagar of an imminent departure of this leader from the Hurriyat Conference led by Syed Ali Shah Geelani. The reasons for departure were vague – ranging from the inability to perform (whatever that means) to protesting the alleged misdemeanours of one of Geelani’s son-in-law – an accusation that is now discredited as contrary empirical evidence emerges.

From a Kashmiri point of view, this was quite a news story for its timing was crucial. When Indian-sponsored local politicians are campaigning for an upcoming by-election for two parliamentary seats, this resignation would have proved to be a severe psychological blow to the pro-freedom camp at a time when they were trying to forge a unified campaign for poll boycott. This was quite a coup for the Indian agencies.      

For the past several months, I have been hearing credible reports about the    embezzlement of a large amount of relief money meant for those injured by the firing during the current phase of the Intifada. Accusations of corruption within our milieu in South Asia or, for that matter, in Pakistan are nothing new, but the embezzlement in the relief money meant for the victims who had been blinded or injured by the Indian army was quite shocking. Through my sources, I found that the resignation of the Hurriyat leader might have been motivated by the alleged embezzlement as it offered an easy route to avoid scrutiny while withholding the money.

The story merited to be told so I put out a short blurb of three or four paragraphs on my Facebook. It generated a marauding mob of words. First, I was ‘advised’, through intermediaries, to withdraw the note. When I refused, citing the accuracy of my sources, one of my friendly acquaintances goaded me and accused me of working for Indian interests. He finally issued veiled threats that ‘I will be asked’ to present myself and will soon receive ‘a call’ – a tactic that usually elicits desired responses. The political representative of the group in Pakistan declared me a danger to the “freedom movement of Kashmir” and demanded my removal from the country.       

In the end, I am still in Pakistan and the person in question has ‘withdrawn’ his resignation. So, all remains hunky-dory!

Postscript: Last August, at the peak of the pro-freedom public rebellion, following the death of Burhan Wani, life was extremely tough as the unending files of army and paramilitary forces paraded with large armoured vehicles to enforce brutal curfews. My routine was punctuated by taking considerable risks while dodging these menacing forces to meet demonstrators, tend to the injured, meet the bereaved, organise some relief and, of course, write in between to report on life as sadness and continued mourning was hanging thick in the air.

Almost four weeks into the siege, in early August, an errand from a senior bureaucrat arrived. He wanted to meet up but I declined. Next day, the errand runner was back and set me up for a conversation on an official mobile phone as all other networks were barred to stop people from talking to each other and organising demonstrations. In a more than usual friendly tone, he offered an official vehicle that would carry me in the dead of the night to have a “friendly chat and discuss the matters of concern”. Responding with a wry laugh, I was candid that such friendly lyrics were not powerful enough to co-opt me for some dirty role. Before handing the phone back to his official, I scolded him for breaching his role as a public servant and acting as an agent of sorts for a particular security agency that I mentioned by name. On his part, he put on a brave face and let out a loud but mechanical laugh that sounded so very ill-intended and lifeless. The conversation ended and we never met. Soon after last week’s Facebook incident, a terse message from him showed up: “So, how does it feel to be an agent”? Without pausing for a breath, I shot back: “You tell me, because you are the one”. It took him a while to respond back with a smiley that looked sarcastically menacing.

Appendage: In an unrelated case, a well-established Srinagar-based journalist who was chatting from a fake Facebook ID asked: “Where are you right now?” I refused to oblige for I told him that I don’t reveal personal details to strangers. This rattled him and he wrote: “By the way, only big time agents travel between continents unscathed”. When I finally managed to decipher his identity and mentioned him by his real name, he showed some degree of regret, but only little, and said: “Hey! No hard feelings”. And, of course, I agreed!

Twitter: @murtaza_shibli