 | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  | FARIDA GHANI met her relatives in Srinagar after 56 years.
It was like "going to Haj". The entire neighbourhood of Nawakadal had turned out to welcome Farida Ghani, 63, (centre) who had migrated to Pakistan in 1949. Women showered rose petals as tears rolled down Ghani's cheeks. After an emotional reunion with her cousins, she visited her school in Gagribal and the Hazratbal shrine. | "We can at least now be
part of each other's joys
and sorrows." | | The year: 1965. Sardar Mohammad Bashir Khan, a farmer in Poonch in Jammu, crosses the ridge to PoK, leaving behind his pregnant wife Zubaida. She gives birth to a son but never remarries, hoping he would come back one day. But Bashir doesn't return. He marries again and settles down in the Kotli district of PoK. In 1986, Bashir's second wife dies. Zubaida gets a Pakistani visa and joins him in PoK. Four decades later, an ageing Bashir turns up at Gahlod, three days after he had crossed the loc on April 7 as one of the 30 passengers on the Muzaffarabad-Srinagar bus, for a reunion with his 39-year-old son and grandchildren he had never met. "It's Allah's miracle," says a teary-eyed Bashir. On the face of it, Bashir Khan's story might seem like a Bollywood tearjerker about a trans-border lost-and-found plot. But the reopening of the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad route has set the stage for many such poignant reunions. The first batch of passengers has not only resurrected the pangs of separation among hundreds of divided families but also unplugged an emotional upsurge that could well be a major driving force for the bus service. Not surprisingly, despite a standing warning from militant outfits against boarding the Karvaan-e-Aman (caravan of peace), the number of prospective passengers continues to swell. The list forwarded to the PoK Government by Indian authorities for clearance for the second journey on April 21 has119 names, against 50 in the list from PoK. Clearly, while the bus has set in motion an emotional catharsis that could alter perceptions in the two Kashmirs, future trans-loc journeys will remain on a wing and a prayer. | | PICTURE SPEAK | |  |  | SARDAR MOHAMMAD BASHIR KHAN met his son in Poonch after 40 years.
It was a meeting of familiar strangers. Bashir Khan, 63, (above and right) who had moved to PoK in 1965, had never met his son Shabir Tariq, who was born after his departure. All these years, the only contact between them was through letters and audio tapes. Four decades later, the retired revenue official finally met his son and grandchildren. Tariq wept like a child even as Bashir looked wistfully at the tin-roofed house on the ridge that was once his home. | | "The guns and mines on the LoC may stay, but peace has given us a way to overcome them" | | MOHAMMAD YAKOOB KHAN met his kin at Chandak after 58 years.
The people of Chandak, 8 km short of Poonch town, walked a long way to meet the "paar ka mehman (guest from across the LoC)". Mohammad Yakoob Khan, 80, who had left his native village in 1947, arrived at the head of a long procession for a reunion with his ailing brother and nephews (above). The retired policeman became emotional when he visited the graves of old friends and relatives (left). The only way he could keep in touch with relatives was by exchanging messages carried by Haj pilgrims from the two countries. He wants the Rawalakot-Poonch route restored so that travelling time can be reduced. Not without reason. Yakoob's village Tetrinot in PoK is a stone's throw away from the LoC and half an hour away from Poonch. But he had to travel 1,100 km, via Islamabad, to his ancestral village. | "I had almost reconciled
to dying without seeing
my brother. It's like a gift
from Allah." | |  | RELATED STORIES: TRIAL BY FIRE In Slow Motion The Duck Stops Here Captain's Knocks "I've survived and will survive longer" Index |
