By Justice Markandey Katju–
(Justice Markandey Katju is a former Judge, Supreme Court of India, and former Chairman of Press Council of India. The views expressed are his own)
On April 6, the Kashmiri Pandits Association, an association of the non-Kashmiri speaking Kashmiri Pandits, (Kashmiri speaking Kashmiri Pandits have their own association called All India Kashmiri Samaj), held a function in Delhi to honor me and Anita Mulla, the daughter of the heroic Indian Navy Captain MN Mulla who went down with his ship Kukri in the war against Pakistan.
Kashmiri Pandits (KPs) are of two types — those who speak Kashmiri, and those who don’t. The former are about 400,000 in number, and the latter a little less than half of that. The latter, including me, are those whose ancestors migrated from Kashmir to the Indian plains about 200 years ago. The former remained in the Kashmir valley until they were driven out by persecution in the 1990s.
The Kashmiri language is so different from Hindi that a Hindi speaker won’t understand it. Our ancestors who migrated from Kashmir spoke Kashmiri, but their descendants forgot it after a couple of generations or so, and could speak only Hindi and English.
However, they retained their KP identity by marrying among the community. Of course, later, many married outside the community. They retained their Kashmiri food habits; they ate meat and prepared Kashmiri delicacies such as Rogan Josh, Kabargaah, Dum Aloo, etc.
Though they did not speak Kashmiri, in certain rituals like Herat puja, they would utter some Kashmiri words which had been passed on for generations, without understanding a word of what they meant — similar to how people recite Sanskrit shlokas without understanding their meaning. These too became distorted over the generations.
For instance, the Kashmiri words ‘kus choo’ (who is it?) became ‘kuch choo’. It was only after I married my wife Rupa, who is a Kashmiri speaking Kashmiri Pandit, that she told me the meaning and the correct pronunciation of these words.
Non-Kashmiri-speaking KPs left Kashmir for job opportunities, not because of persecution. To understand this, we must try and understand KP history a bit.
Kashmir was conquered by Mughal Emperor Akbar in 1588 who deposed the last independent ruler of Kashmir Yusuf Shah Chak, and incorporated Kashmir into the Mughal Empire.
Mughal rule was beneficial to KPs. At that time, KPs comprised only about 5% of the total Kashmiri population, the rest having converted to Islam. The Mughals needed a buffer between themselves and the local Muslim population, so they made KPs landlords, whose tenants/servants were the local Muslims.
KPs not only became landlords but were also the educated class in Kashmir (Kashmiri Muslims then being almost all illiterate), and they were very proficient in Persian and Urdu, which were the languages of the elite in the entire Indian subcontinent.
Because they were proficient in Persian and Urdu, KPs were in great demand in the princely states, where the court languages were Persian and Urdu. During the Raj, a part of India was under direct British rule, while another part was under the princely states — those that were ruled by Maharajas and Nawabs (who, however, regarded the British as paramount).
Most of eastern India was under direct British rule, since Bengal was the first big base of the British in India after the battles of Plassey in 1757 and Buxar in 1764. From there, British rule expanded westward. The Maharajas of western and central India (Punjab, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, etc) were allowed to continue their rule and their court languages (even of Hindu rulers) were Persian and Urdu.
The ancestors of all non-Kashmiri-speaking KPs came to the plains of India in exactly the same way, including those of former Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, the eminent lawyer Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru, and many others. They got jobs as officials in the courts of Maharaja and Nawabs on account of their proficiency in Persian and Urdu. They were trustworthy, industrious, and men of honor, and soon rose to high positions; many even becoming Dewans (equivalent to Prime Minister) in their states.
My own ancestor, Pt Mansa Ram Katju, who migrated from Kashmir 200 years ago, was employed in the court of the Nawab of Jaora, which was a princely state in what is currently western Madhya Pradesh bordering Rajasthan, and for many generations his descendants served there. Pt Mansa Ram wrote in the register of a panda (local Hindu priest) in Kurukshetra “Ba-talaash-e-maash aamadam” (“I have come in quest of bread”).
The descendant of the KP immigrants, too, became court officials in the princely states, but after a few generations some branched off and joined the legal profession as lawyers. This happened because KPs were an intellectual class, not physical laborers. The only avenue then available to intellectuals at the time was the legal profession. There was no IAS then, and the ICS recruits were mainly British.
At that time, most lawyers in India were sons of zamindars (landlords). This was because, in those days, a new lawyer would not earn anything for up to five years of law practice. Therefore, only sons of zamindars could sustain themselves in the early years of their practice as they received some allowances from their wealthy father.
For KPs who entered the legal profession, though, there was no zamindari to fall back on. They had to earn from almost the start of their practice, and they had to work hard day and night to quickly master the law. They soon gained a reputation for their knowledge of law and uprightness, and started getting clients. They quickly rose high, and became top lawyers in the country.
Thus, in what is present-day Uttar Pradesh, some of the top lawyers in the Allahabad High Court — Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru, Pt Moti Lal Nehru, Dr KN Katju etc — were KPs. Even the district courts in UP, the top lawyer would be a KP. For example, Prithvinath Chak in Kanpur, Shangloo Saheb in Fyzabad (now Ayodhya), Anand Narain Tankha in Dehradun (now in Uttarakhand), Bakshi Saheb in Hardoi, Masaldan Saheb (father of the President of KPA Gen Masaldan) in Sitapur, etc.
In other states, too, the situation was not much different. Raj Kumar Tankha, who began his law practice in Rewa District Court, became a judge of the Madhya Pradesh High Court at a young age. In all likelihood, he would have become the Chief Justice of India (as he was senior to Justice JS Verma who became CJI), but for his untimely death at the age of 51. His son Vivek Tankha is currently one of India’s top lawyers as well as an MP.
Then, there was Justice Shambhu Nath Pandit, a KP, who became the first Indian Judge of a High Court in 1863.
Later, when more avenues opened, KPs went into the corporate sector, became professors, doctors, engineers, etc, and many have migrated to the US and elsewhere, where they have done very well.
