Salman Rushdie - Shalimar the Clown

For many years the political echelon had been reluctant. For too long it had said yes and no at the same time. But now at last there was movement. The character of the political echelon had changed. Its new belief system was supported by prominent members of the intellectual tier and the economic stratum and held that the introduction of Islam in the classical period had been uniformly deleterious, a cultural calamity, and that centuries-overdue corrections needed to be made. Heavyweight figures in the intellectual tier spoke of a new awakening of the suppressed cultural energy of the Hindu masses. Prominent inhabitants of the economic stratum invested massively in this glistening new zero-tolerance world. The political echelon responded positively to such encouragement. The introduction of President’s Rule provided security personnel with unrestricted powers. The amended code of criminal procedure immunized all public servants, soldiers included, against prosecution for deeds performed in the line of duty. The definition of such deeds was broad and included destruction of private property, torture, rape and murder.

The political echelon’s decision to declare Kashmir a “disturbed area” was also greatly appreciated. In a disturbed area, search warrants were not required, arrest warrants ditto, and shoot-to-kill treatment of suspects was acceptable. Suspects who remained alive could be arrested and detained for two years, during which period it would not be necessary to charge them or to set a date for their trial. For more dangerous suspects the political echelon permitted more severe responses. Persons who committed the ultimate crime of challenging the territorial integrity of India or in the opinion of the armed forces attempted to disrupt same could be jailed for five years. Interrogation of such suspects would take place behind closed doors and confessions extracted by force during these secret interrogations would be admissible as evidence provided the interrogating officer had reason to believe the statement was being made voluntarily. Confessions made after the suspect was beaten or hung by the feet, or after he had experienced electricity or the crushing of his hands or feet, would be considered as being voluntary. The burden of proof would be shifted and it would be for these persons to prove the falsehood of the automatic presumption of guilt. If they failed so to do the death penalty could be applied.

In the dark General Kachhwaha experienced a smooth, ovoid feeling of satisfaction, even vindication. His own old theory, which proposed the essentially sneaky and subversive nature of the Kashmiri Muslim population in toto, and which in bygone times he had reluctantly set aside, was one whose time had come. The political echelon had sent word. Every Muslim in Kashmir should be considered a militant. The bullet was the only solution. Until the militants were wiped out normality could not return to the valley. General Kachhwaha smiled. Those were instructions he could follow.

He had moved on from Elasticnagar to Army Corps Headquarters at Badami Bagh, Srinagar. In spite of its name this was no fragrant almond garden but a center of naked power. General Kachhwaha on his arrival at the giant base had immediately given orders for the replication of his old suite of rooms in Elasticnagar and soon sat once more in darkness, at the center of the web. There was nothing he needed to witness in person anymore. He knew everything and forgot nothing. He went nowhere and was everywhere. He sat in darkness and saw the valley, every cranny of it, bathed in garish light. He felt the bloat of memory expanding his body, he was all swollen up, stuffed full of the babel of the unforgotten, and the confusion of his senses grew ever more extreme. The idea of violence had a velvet softness now. One took off one’s gloves and smelled the sweet fragrance of necessity. Bullets entered flesh like music, the pounding of clubs was the rhythm of life, and then there was the sexual dimension to consider, the demoralization of the population through the violation of its women. In that dimension every color was bright and tasted good. He closed his eyes and averted his head. What must be, must be.

The insurgency was pathetic. It fought against itself. Half of it was fighting for that old fairy tale, Kashmir for the Kashmiris, while the other half wanted Pakistan, and to be a part of the Islamist terror international. The insurrectionists would kill each other while he watched. But he would kill them too, to hurry things along. He didn’t care what they wanted. He wanted them dead. In the darkness, while he waited, he had refined and perfected the philosophy and methodology of the coming crackdown. The philosophy of crackdown was, fuck the enemy in the crack. The methodology of crackdown could be expressed technically as cordon-and-search. Curfews would be imposed and soldiers would go house to house. It could also be expressed colloquially as, and then fuck them in the crack again. Town by town, hamlet by hamlet, every part of the valley would be visited by his wrath, by men who had taken their gloves off, his warriors, his storm troopers, his fists. He would see how much these people loved their insurgency then, when they had the Indian army fucking them in the crack.

He knew everything and forgot nothing. He read the reports and closed his eyes and ate with relish the scenes he conjured up, drawing nourishment from the details. Village Z came under crackdown and the headmaster of the school was picked up, a bastard by the name of A. He stood accused of being a militant. He dared to lie and deny it, saying he was not a militant but a headmaster. He was asked to identify which of his pupils were militants and this man, this self-avowed headmaster, had the nerve to claim not only that he did not know about his own students but also that he didn’t know any militants at all. But every Kashmiri was a militant as had been laid down by the political echelon and so this liar was lying and needed to be assisted toward the truth. He was beaten, obviously. Then his beard was set on fire. Then electricity was offered to his eyes, his genitals and his tongue. Afterwards he claimed to have been blinded in one eye, which was an obvious lie, an attempt to blame the investigators for a previously existing condition. He had no pride and begged the men to stop. He repeated his lie, that he was just a schoolteacher, which offended them. To assist him they took him to a small stream containing dirty water and broken glass. The liar was pushed into the stream and kept there for five hours. The men walked over him with their boots, applying his head to the rocks in the water. He lost consciousness to avoid questioning, so when he woke up they chastised him again. In the end it was deemed correct to let him go. He was warned that the next time he would be killed. He ran away screaming, I swear I’m not a militant. I’m a schoolteacher. These people were beyond saving. There was no hope for them.

The town of Y came under crackdown and a middle-aged man by the name of B was picked up along with his sixteen-year-old son, C. The door to his home, a suspected terrorist rat’s nest, was kicked down. To show him that the matter was serious his father’s Qur’an was thrown to the floor and muddy boots were applied to it. There would be no more special treatment for Muslims. That had to be understood. His daughter was ordered into the back room from which she crawled out of a window and escaped, which was unfortunate but proved that this was a high-value family of rat terrorists. The sixteen-year-old was formally accused of terrorism. He had the cheek to deny. Again he was accused and again denied. And a third time, ditto. He said he was a student and such subterfuge inflamed the sentiments of the men. He was taken outside and rifle butts were applied to his person. The father, B, tried to intervene and he also required vigorous physical attention. When the terrorist youth, C, lost consciousness he was put in the back of a truck and taken away for his own benefit, for medical assistance. At a later time the middle-aged man, B, claimed that his son had been located in a ditch unclothed and with a bullet in his back. This was not the doing of the men. Probably after he had received medical attention and was allowed to go home he encountered terrorists of a rival faction and they attended to him.