Carrying Packs!

Our valley has marked an increase in the number of vehicles whether public or private. No matter how it adds on transport to streets, we are fond of packing the public carriers. Local transport has always been a mess in Kashmir. However, we have seen a gradual shift from Tongas to Matadors to those of the Buses, our local transport has always made a score in compressing the space. Our local transport doesn’t seem to be public carriers but cattle wagons; packed the way they like to. Though drivers have a distinct cabin; aware but unheeded, the conductor is the only managing director of a bus. The remaining public is forced to adhere to one another, even now in times of Covid. The public is not spared of the crowd. They watch themselves violate the issued guidelines, yet they don’t bat an eyelid. Call it consented oppression; this forced will-less nod approves of our imprudence and recklessness. This kind of repression is the lousiest form as we pay for it. The irony is we pay them for this brutality in money. In Kashmir, we have an astounding exchange system of barbarity for money and vice versa – while this is a mutual one. Dumb civilians are so used to oppression that they are not able to question their own people. We have lost the sense of questioning, revolting, and resisting. All we master is ‘promoting.’ We promote what may come our way. Though one fails to understand why is it difficult in Kashmir to infringe the self-made laws, one should ponder over one’s role in promoting the same.