'K-Files' has clearly done more harm than good, say Kashmiri Pandits

Top Pandit leader says they were working hard to bridge the gap between the two communities, but the movie has driven a wedge between them again

NT Correspondent

Kashmir: When The Kashmir Files was released in March this year, it was very divisive. While rightwing fringe organisations lauded it for portraying an 'ignored' part of Kashmir history, it drew criticism from everyone else for its factual inaccuracies and for promoting hate speech by showing all Kashmiri Muslims as terrorist sympathizers.

Directed by controversial filmmaker Vivek Agnihotri, screenings of the film were followed by incitement of violence against Muslims by moviegoers in parts of the country.  In light of recent events, Article 14 interviewed Kashmiri Pandits on their YouTube channel from the valley about what they thought about the film.

Sanjay Tickoo, president of the Kashmiri Pandit Sangharsh Samiti, said, “Because of this movie, we have lost 80 per cent of our sympathizers from the majority community, which now thinks of us as collaborators in what is being done to them, like the removal of Article 370.”

Between 2002 and 2019, no Kashmiri Pandit had been killed in Kashmir, but after the removal of Article 370, nine have lost their lives. “We can sense the change in mindset. We have been working hard to bridge the gap between the two communities, and this film has driven a wedge between us again,” he added.

The film undoes the efforts of Kashmiri Pandits who want to move back to Kashmir, according to advocate Deepika Pushkar who says, “It is a hysterical work made with ill-motives, and we need to call it out because no one has the right to sell the suffering of Kashmiri Pandits and use it to become successful.”

The film became the second-highest grosser at the box office owing to the promotion by India’s ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and tax benefits, with even the Prime Minister praising the film.

Recently, the film stirred controversy again when Nadav Lapid, an Israeli filmmaker and the chief juror at the International Film Festival of India, called it vulgar propaganda and inappropriate for artistic competition at such a prestigious film festival in front of members of the ruling government at the festival’s closing ceremony.

The film has many inaccuracies; chief among them is the portrayal of Kashmiri Muslims. “The movie shows that 100% of the Muslims supported the terrorists. If that were true, we wouldn’t still be alive today,” says Sandeep Koul, a resident of Kashmir.

Other incidents in the movie where a woman is forced to eat the blood-stained rice after her husband is murdered and a massacre where terrorists separate the Hindus and Muslims in the village and kill the Hindus never happened.

Mohit Bhat, a Kashmiri Pandit politician, says, “The government facilitated the right-wing fringe elements to propagate hate speech and label Kashmiri Muslims as ter rorists. This is the biggest flaw of the movie.” The film clearly has done more harm than good due to its political agenda and misrepresentation of the plight of Kashmiri Pandits that hasn’t even gone down well with the community who feel more afraid now about living in Kashmir