Srinagar: Engineer Rashid sits below a framed inscription of the last sermons of Prophet Muhammad at his residence at Jawahar Nagar in Srinagar.
Rashid sips his morning tea and bazir tchot – a flat Kashmiri bread – looks at the ceiling and bursts out, “The Kashmiri people are humiliated all the time by all governments sitting in Delhi since 1947 and now Modi and his government are no less.”
Engineer Rashid on the campaign trail. Photo: Shome Basu.
Engineer Rashid’s supporters while he is on the campaign trail. Photo: Shome Basu.
He says, “I was never a militant, I am not a politician either, I am an activist and want honour back for Kashmiri people. Today I feel this election may be one of the processes to give back the honour to my people.”
Engineer Rashid rests while on the campaign trail. Photo: Shome Basu.
The ceiling of his room is damp. Rashid looks tired. He is out of jail for the election campaign and will be back in Delhi’s Tihar Jail by October 2. He says he wants to see peace in the valley and has no tolerance for political gimmicks.
Rashid breaks down while talking about the Union government’s treatment of him. Photo: Shome Basu.
Engineer Rashid on the campaign trail. Photo: Shome Basu.
Rashid notes that statehood needs to return to Kashmir to restore the little autonomy Kashmiris are owed. “Kashmir has come to a crossroads where communalism, criminalisation and commercialisation is how everyone and especially the BJP treats it,” he says.
Engineer Rashid’s convoy on the campaign trail. The pressure cooker is his symbol. Photo: Shome Basu.
He believes in solving the problem by sitting together and looking for a common roadmap.
When I asked about the future of Jammu and Kashmir, he says without elaborating that stakeholders need to sit together and devise a solution.
Engineer Rashid with a local leader at his house. Photo: Shome Basu.
Engineer Rashid talks to a voter on the campaign trail. Photo: Shome Basu.
What compelled Rashid to launch the AIP and take part in party politics while refuting the charges of money laundering invoked against him by the NIA ,which have kept him in prison for the last five and a half years? A chance run-in with Yasin Malik – whose politics Rashid was not a fan of – at a court in 2019 led to this decision. Both leaders had been incarcerated by then. “Have you seen India’s democracy? Jump into politics then,” Malik told him, he says.
Rashid flashes a victory sign on the campaign trail. Photo: Shome Basu.
Rashid is called the ‘angry man’ of Kashmir. When I met him in the early 2000s at a Kashmir Conference in New Delhi, he had little by way of popularity. Now, he has a huge support base in Baramulla, Uri, Kupwara and Patan.
Engineer Rashid near the end of a day of campaigns. Photo: Shome Basu.
The campaign has left him tired. But still, sitting in the front seat of a Mahindra Scorpio, circled by security forces, he responds to shouts of “Aya aya sher aya (the tiger has come).”
All photos by Shome Basu.
