A fitting tribute to journalists in Kashmir
https://arab.news/jwqgu
Three Indian Associated Press photojournalists—Dar Yasin, Mukhtar Khan, and Channi Anand—have won a prestigious Pulitzer Prize for feature photography for their work in Kashmir.
The Pulitzer Committee’s decision represents a two-fold triumph for freedom of the press: First, three talented journalists have received the highest honor for their bravery in a region where journalists labor under trying and dangerous conditions. Second, their award will bring harrowing images of Kashmiris—which the Indian state often tries to prevent the world from seeing—greater exposure and prominence.
Kashmir has long been subjected to the heavy-handed actions of an entrenched Indian military. For many Kashmiris and their supporters, this is an occupation, pure and simple. Amid these oppressive conditions, curtailments of freedoms are inevitable. And that includes assaults on press freedoms. Over the last few weeks alone, in the throes of the coronavirus pandemic, several Kashmiri journalists have been booked on charges of unlawful and “anti-national” activities—code for content that is critical of the Indian government and state.
This isn’t to say that journalists can’t report from Kashmir—they can and do, and often critically. But they operate under oppressive and intimidating conditions.
And yet Yasin, Khan, and Anand persevered. Their cameras were everywhere, and they captured a series of moving and iconic images over the course of 2019.
What stands out the most, however, are the lengths that the three photojournalists went to ensure that these photos were actually seen by the world—and especially after India’s revocation of Kashmir’s autonomy last August.
Michael Kugelman
The images are tragic: Mourners in a funeral procession grieving over the body of an 11-year-old girl killed by Indian security forces, and a dazed and bloodied woman on a stretcher gazing intensely at the camera. They are haunting: Buildings burning after a shootout between security forces and militants, a boy carefully extracting a bullet from a wall and deserted city streets during a curfew.
And they are beautiful: A man walking over a footbridge in the snow near Dal Lake, a lovely landmark in the city of Srinagar.
What stands out the most, however, are the lengths that the three photojournalists went to ensure that these photos were actually seen by the world—and especially after India’s revocation of Kashmir’s autonomy last August. After New Delhi made that move, it cut off all communication in Kashmir for many months. It also banned foreign journalists from entering Kashmir. Local residents were cut off from the world—not knowing that they had lost their autonomy, and not knowing how the world was reacting. The lucky ones managed to escape elsewhere to access the internet and to make phone calls. Indian officials also arrested journalists, politicians, and businesspeople there. And the region experienced a lockdown that was draconian even by Kashmir’s standards.
Against this backdrop, the Pulitzer awardees developed a clever plan. As chronicled by the AP: “Snaking around roadblocks, sometimes taking cover in strangers’ homes and hiding cameras in vegetable bags, the three photographers captured images of protests, police and paramilitary action and daily life — and then headed to an airport to persuade travellers to carry the photo files out with them and get them to the AP’s office in New Delhi.”
In effect, the three journalists risked their lives to ensure that the world could see the images that the Indian government didn’t want it to see.
Some Indians have reacted angrily to the news that three of their own have won a Pulitzer. This isn’t the first time that those winning prestigious prizes have been maligned in their own country. Malala Yousafzai, the schoolgirl shot by the Taliban, was heavily criticized by many fellow Pakistanis after she earned a Nobel Prize in 2014. Some were jealous; others thought she had sold out to achieve international fame.
In the case of the Indian photojournalists, it comes down to the sensitivities and volatilities surrounding the Kashmir issue—and particularly competing narratives. Some Indians believe the Pulitzer awardees only took photos that depicted Indian soldiers in a bad light and suffering Muslim children—and not those that portrayed soldiers acting benignly or Hindu children’s grieving parents killed by militants. According to these critics, the Pulitzer Prize is biased.
Also, many Indian nationalists objected to the Pulitzer Board saying it had awarded its feature photography prize to the three journalists for their “striking images of life in the contested territory of Kashmir as India revoked its independence.” That last word is problematic. Indeed, last August India revoked Kashmir’s autonomy, not its independence. And according to many Indians, New Delhi had the constitutional right to do so.
When it comes to something as fraught and contested as Kashmir, language—even a single word—can be inflammatory. But this shouldn’t take away from the achievement of the three photojournalists, who had nothing to do with the wording used by the Pulitzer Board. They were recognized for their brave work in a place where many brave journalists don’t receive proper recognition. And that’s something to be admired.
- Michael Kugelman is deputy director of the Asia Program and senior associate for South Asia at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars.
Twitter: @michaelkugelman
