'Servants of the Sahibs'

Between the Karakul and Western suits lies Kashmir’s fractured self, caught between pride, inferiority, and identity crisis.

- Wajahat Qazi

Ata wedding a couple of days ago, | wore a shalwar kameez and a Karakul hat. (This, along with the Kashmiri pheran and the Karakul, is my preferred dress in winter.) When I walked into the guest area, | instantly became the center of attention, uncomfortably and strangely so.

Almost all the guests were wearing Western outfits, garishly ill-suited and poorly carried, at least to my eyes. But two interactions stood out.

The first was with a middle-aged doctor, a man who reads, is interested in mysticism, and could also be described as a rationalist, a man of reason.

This doctor friend stood up and said, “The Karakul looks amazing and graceful.” It was as genuine a compliment as one could expect in Kashmir, where people rarely give or receive compliments, both are often seen as false or insincere.

The other was my cousin, also middle-aged. After mingling with his brown-skinned cousins wearing sunglasses that looked out of place in the setting, some of them “Amreeka-returned”, he noticed me and walked over.

“Wajahat sahib, how are you?” he asked, laughing in my face. | understood the laughter. It was directed at my shalwar kameez and Karakul.

The same cousin once called me and said, “Some of my friends, in an alarmed tone, asked if all was well with you, given that you wear the Karakul, and that too with a tilt!”

Prior to going to the wedding, | had sent a picture of myself in the Karakul to an American friend. “Very dapper,” he wrote back.

Before I elaborate further, | should make my attitude toward the West clear. 1 like to think that, to borrow the words of a correspondent of mine, I “have a foot in many doors.”