India tours broaden horizons of J&K kids

One of the most positive signals that has emerged from Jammu and Kashmir in the past few weeks is the way that ordinary schoolchildren in the Valley and their parents decided to defy threats and warnings by extremist elements in order to take part in the “Bharat Darshan” tours organised by the Indian Army.

Over the past two decades, this writer has had the opportunity to meet schoolchildren from the Valley on similar tours, ever since the Army and later the Border Security Force began organising them. Interacting with the children was always interesting and insightful: in each tour, it emerged that many had stepped out of their tehsil or district for the first time, and visiting places like Delhi, Agra and elsewhere was for many a mind-blowing experience, and often for the teachers accompanying them as well. Many of the children and teachers hail from Valley areas where there are elements who actively propagate anti-Army or anti-security forces sentiment, but the Army and BSF officers who conduct these tours say that exposure to parts of India outside Kashmir has a profound effect on the students and they often go back home with new hopes and aspirations.

On December 1, 2015, reports from Srinagar claimed Aasiya Andrabi, head of the separatist women’s outfit Dukhtaran-e-Millat, had warned parents not to send their daughters on these Army-organised “Bharat Darshan” tours, and said: “It is shameful and deplorable on the part of those parents, the Army as well as schools that have consented and enrolled Class 11 and 12 daughters for the Army tour. I am not appealing to these parents but warning them to desist from such activities.”

Andrabi claimed that a number of parents had telephoned to tell her that the authorities of various girls’ schools in the Valley had been asking Class 11 and 12 girl students to enrol for the Army tours. “This is un-Islamic. A Muslim society like Kashmir never approves (of) such shady tours,” Andarbi is reported to have said. She also appealed to clerics and religious leaders to raise their voice against the Army’s “new tactics” and the consequences of such “fishy tours”.

But completely ignoring this warning, a group of 30 girl students from various schools embarked on an Army-sponsored tour a few days later. The BSF followed suit with 41 girls and boys. A defence spokesman said: “Towards its commitment for better education of youth in general and women’s empowerment in particular, the Army organised a 10-day educational tour for 30 girl students of various higher secondary schools of Srinagar to Delhi and Agra.”

Flagged off at the Badami Bagh cantonment by Maj. Gen. Mukesh Kumar, commander of 31 Sub-Area, the group included the children, two women teachers and some Army personnel along with their spouses. Their itinerary encompassed visits to premier educational institutions, including IIT Delhi, Delhi University, Miranda House, Jesus and Mary College and Maulana Azad College. The students visited monuments like the Qutub Minar, Red Fort, Humayun’s Tomb, the Rail Museum, as well as the Taj Mahal and Agra Fort. They interacted with Union home minister Rajnath Singh. The spokesman said the parents, guardians, principals and teachers present at the flagging-off ceremony lauded the Army’s efforts to run these educative tours, that also help students to orient themselves to career options for a brighter future.

The concept of “Bharat Darshan” tours started in 2000 and since then have been held every year for Kashmir’s children. Till now, over 1,500 children from J&K have participated in 52 tours sponsored by the BSF, and many more by the Army. These tours are meant to make the children familiar with the country’s historical, cultural and social roots, as well as the progress it has made in the industrial, technological and scientific fields, and thus inculcate in them a sense of pride. The Bharat Darshan tours widen their horizons and have given them an opportunity to see the nation’s diversity. It also gives them a chance to interact with people from different cultures, religions and languages. Just as important, the children from Kashmir had several opportunities to interact with their contemporaries from different parts of India, there was an exchange of ideas and they could see that their hopes, fears and aspirations were often similar to children elsewhere. The lasting effect of this, after they go back to their homes in the Valley, could be incalculable.

Dukhtaran-e-Millat’s Andarabi, who organised a series of pro-Pakistan events this year, has often been criticised for trying to change the traditional sufi or liberal ethos of the Kashmir Valley into an extremist Islamist culture. She has also come under fire for inciting Kashmiri youth towards “jihad” against India while her own son is doing higher studies in Malaysia on an Indian passport.