Novel writing is an art in which an author wields a magnifying glass to accentuate the minutest observations; on the other hand, his microscopic eye spares nothing within the world around the plot. A plot, in a novel, is not merely a sequence of events, but slices of life which the novelist links like life fragments to create a holistic representation of the world, weaving through characters.
Kashmiri novels, especially those of Dr. Sohan Kaul’s are distinguished by sophisticated narrative techniques, structural richness, and, above all, by his capacity to leave an impression on even the softest screen: urging the rest of the world to take note of people’s plight, unrest, conflict, and the search for better resolution and inclusiveness.
This novel is a vivid portrayal of the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits and its far-reaching consequences. In many ways, it belongs to the corpus of exile literature, pulling the curtain back to reveal the plight of the Kashmiri Pandits whose suffering multiplied during their years in camp life. It depicts not only the material hardships they endured but also the cultural onslaught that threatened their identity and traditions.
The narrative highlights the anxieties of displaced parents, deeply troubled by the exposure of their children to an environment they had never imagined for them—one marked by deprivation, dislocation, and loss. The Pandits were put to severe tests: adjusting to the unbearable summer heat of unfamiliar regions, grappling with inadequate facilities in refugee camps, and struggling to sustain their cultural continuity. In this sense, the novel does more than recount displacement; it becomes a testimony to collective trauma, resilience, and the struggle for dignity in exile.
The novel opens with Sarla reflecting on faith and her illness. Pushkar’s conversation serves as a lens, guiding the reader to look back. This framing appears intermittently, linking the reader with Sarla’s present state of health and the events that shape her role. Through memories and inner reflections, the story traces a path that connects the reader to her past. There is a marked oscillation between past and present, with fragments woven together to build her character.
At times, childhood memories and days of yore, infused with the whiff of agony and the unfolding of her heart, carry the reader back to Ganpatyar, to her passions and her innocent romance with Masterji (Ashok Raina), her secret beloved. The exposition of the novel opens with two innocent secret lovers, but with the passage of time, the exodus separates them, leaving behind a chasm, one that Sarla fills only partially with her endless waiting for him, and partially with her unending agony.
Analysis
The story is set in the Thokar Kuth, the ‘worship room’. It is a symbolic space meant for devotion, which sets the stage for romance. This transformation does not seem accidental, but clearly signals the recurrent motif of violation of boundaries—personal, social, and often spiritual as well. This compromised setting and shift of traditional value systems, in a way, foreshadow the turmoil that awaits the characters.
Placing such a scene in a sanctified domestic place, the novel acts as a critique to bring to the fore the fragility of societal safety measures. Psychologically speaking, Sarla’s obedience is framed not as apathy but as mindful intercession. The novel confronts a dilemma: mentorship versus love.
Sarla’s submission does seem insignificant but is overloaded with uncertainties. Keeping the greater arc of the novel in consideration, this scene sets a threshold: one between childhood and adulthood, and another between sanctity and sensuality. One cannot deny individual desire and communal expectations.
Sarla’s character symbolizes a serious mismatch of familial, political, and emotional realms amidst a forced rupture of cultures. This is the moment in the novel that reframes the exploration of scars. The narrator seems to convey that not all wounds are imposed by violence or exile; most of them are etched deep into the very consciousness and leave ugly marks, like disturbed days of yore.
The migration scenes in the novel expose emotional and political unrest. Sarla’s intimacy all of a sudden collides with the ruthless force of history. Her emotional state is shattered into bits when she combats the collective ordeal of exile. The narrator aptly shifts the register from personal odyssey to communal disturbance. This transferral of stages displays the displacement of lives and recasts them into the obscurity of tents and long queues amidst the merciless and scorching blaze of the sun.
The description of Geeta Bhawan is not only vivid but copious with agonies. The families are seen scattered, disoriented, waiting in unending queues, strangers sharing easily broken gestures of sympathy, and, above all, a lack of generosity. Geeta Bhawan, in a broader perspective, seems a purgatory mishandled by misfortune. Mishriwala camp bears a symbolic significance of the collective trauma of Kashmiri Pandits.
Snakebites, long queues for relief, ration card corruption, and consequences on Sarla. She lost her chastity for a ration card. The ration card turned out to be the ticket to hell for Sarla. The ration card not only exposed the malice of the issuing authority but also spoiled two characters. The ration ticket proved to be a ticket for lust to satiate the sensuousness of the official and a license to grab innocent girls just for a bag of rice.
The grains at the camp were not just a plate of rice but a platform of lust, greed, and exploitation of hardships. Sarla and her community are held like sinners to undergo a purgation before their entry into safe havens. The change of identity, the migrant card, under such circumstances is the only official address they hold, which not only summarizes the loss of rooted identity but also ancestral displacement. This social bargain of lives clearly brings before the eyes the plight of modern refugee narratives, sharing the common pain of the sufferers.
Sarla and her community fight with snakes, ration shortages, and humiliation on one hand, yet on the other, she clings to the hope of Ashok Raina’s presence. The novel suggests that human beings cannot give up yearning; rather, in the novel, it has turned into an act of resistance. If we profoundly delve into the very matrix of the narrative using cultural and historical devices, one can easily describe it as the Pandit exodus of 1990 translated into literature. This may not be labelled as political controversy but as a haunting echo, a brutally chiselled chaos, an unwilling division of a composite culture.
The memories of the homeland hanging on the bruised walls of existence, amidst finding schooling for children and navigating cultural mismatch, a redraft of a new chapter devoid of clarity, yet a pictorial representation offering valid and intricate details of exile literature. This runs in the foreground, highlighting the continuous suffering of the masses.
Sarla is sketched as an archetype of the suffering woman who encounters patriarchal society that redesigns lives based on dominance rather than personal choice. She is an epitome of sacrifices, be it her love, family, or survival. Her self-dismemberment saved the life of another woman; she donated her kidneys even when she had nothing to fall back upon and left the world, leaving her organs to function.
She took contraceptives to keep the rights of Shuhul alive, denied her own motherhood to protect the child of another woman, and marked the presence of a mother despite Shuhul’s hatred and rejection.
(The Author is a distinguished Kashmiri novelist, poet, translator, columnist, reviewer and script writer with over two decades of contributions to literature and education and guiding aspiring writers through creative writing workshops and pedagogy training)
