by: Fiza Aijaz Reshi
Kashmir is known for its heaven-like beauty, its unique culture, tradition & its kind people. We found beautiful mountains, with seasonally color-changing effects, natural springs & waterfalls which give Kashmir a unique natural view. It’s not wrong to say that Kashmir is also known as the land of Sufis. From its beginning, we found named faces of such personalities, with simple living, they glow the candle of Islam in every heart & every corner of Kashmir. They spend their every day of life for mankind & by following their teachings the Kashmiri societies had reformed at large. In every part of life, we found the imprints of Sufis in the Kashmiris. In every home of Kashmir, we found the teachings of Sufism to a large extent.
Sufism was introduced in the 13th century. It’s a mystical sect of Islam that became a cornerstone of Kashmir’s unique culture. Sufi saints and scholars introduced it. In the early years, the people of Kashmir were greatly influenced by the ideologies and teachings of Sufis. This was a time when there was enough poverty in the valley, but instead of that, books were found in most homes. But nowadays, we find that fewer people in Kashmir were affiliated with books, mostly of Sufism.
In the year 2024, Kashmiri society had changed drastically, the ideologies & teachings of Sufism had been overlapped by the ideologies of the West. The youth of Kashmir have made distance from the age-old traditions & teachings. Nowadays we don’t know our culture at large & have followed the changing trends & ideologies of the West. It’s not wrong to read, but to follow the path of Western ideologies is, because their ideologies are free of boundaries & they can do everything according to their wants.
Alama Iqbal rightly said, ” If you go towards the west, you will drown.” The culture of simple dressing in Kashmir overlapped with the culture of the West. Both boys & girls in our society were involved in adopting the Western thoughts, jeans culture, and ideology of free will & choice, just to show that today they are modern by changing their outlook. Changing the outlook doesn’t mean that we are modern, wearing earrings, cutting jeans, odd hair cut & so on by the young boys & wearing tight jeans, giving themself a boy look, showing their naked body by wearing transparent clothes by girls, what does it mean. Its nothing, it just shows our vulgarity.
Modernity should be in our inner self, in our thought & in our view. Following others & adopting their culture doesn’t mean we are modern. Improving one’s self through knowledge is modernity. Caring for mankind, respecting mankind, and respecting others’ religion & thought is modernity. Western countries imprint their thought of free will & free choice on us. By this, we lost ourselves, our culture, our purpose of life & our loved ones. Today our society has become the toys of the West, by following them in everyday life.
It’s not the fault of Western countries if a company manufactures a poison for rats & it’s taken by a man who is responsible? The same is like with us, our society adopts new ceremonies, trends, cultures & new ideologies forgetting our own, without thinking of our future generations. Our one wrong step could become the cause of the destruction of our future societies.
Islam teaches us the way of life & we can’t bring change in any single teaching of Islam. As we know the first verse of the Quran was revealed as Iqra which means to read & we have to read rather than being dependent on others. Year 2024, is the year of the great revolution in science & technology & artificial intelligence (AI). The people of the West made their lives full of comfort & ease by using this technology. In every field, they are far more forward than us because they know the true meaning & use of technology.
But, what we have done? We create burdens for ourselves & for society at large. In today’s society if we want or help the poor we upload them on social media not taking care of their image in society, just to show off & for our popularity in simple language. We create memes, jokes, and baseless videos by using the same technology rather than any useful research.
When any society is down to earth, its last hope is the young educated youth. But when the youths are busy creating or doing baseless things in society then what will one do? In today’s world, we are nothing without the internet & it has both advantages & disadvantages, depending on how we use it.
today most youth prefer online education & self-study. By using the internet, they are cracking the national level examinations & have brightened their future. Instead of this, many individuals lost lakhs of rupees, some lost their families and properties & some lost their lives by the wrong use of the internet.
In today’s society, we found major issues which were not before, such as late marriage, new customs & traditions & show off, rather than being simple. One popular phrase in Kashmir is,” One sat on the horse, the other one sat on the wall”. And this has become the reason for the growing issues in our society, & because of this, the condition of middle-class families has worsened day by day.
Marriage a beautiful bond between two souls has also been affected by this showoff in our society. In the early years, when society preferred simple Marriage only 2-3 lakh rupees were required, but now 50-60 lakhs or more are spent on this because of new ceremonies & traditions in society. All this has worsened the conditions of families & became the reason for the late marriage situation in Kashmir. In our society, young youths have to come a step forward to prefer the simple Niqah & Marriage because the youth can bring a change in any society. And should avoid the baseless ceremonies, customs & traditions in our society at large.
In today’s society, youths are educated in our eyes, but when they can’t make the difference between what is right & what is wrong, then how can we say so? We read but don’t know what we read, or how to read & we have certificates but don’t know our value in this developing world. Rather than using technology & AI, to improve ourselves & society, we invest our precious time in scrolling videos on FB, Instagram, Snapchat, and other platforms. Youths spend their time in baseless activities rather than acquiring knowledge, this has also become the reason for the highest unemployment rate in our society.
Rather than following the way towards Allah, by following the path of Prophets, Sufis & Scholars, the youths in our society are moving on the path of uneducated, dull-minded, YouTubers and musicians. Which are following the trends & those trends haven’t any value in the future. Our youths are willingly following them without looking towards themselves, their parents & society & their future.
In our society, musicians & YouTubers have become more valuable than a PHD scholars & Preachers. Rather than holding the pen, we hold the trends. Which have overlapped our inner-self & Through these trends our day-to-day simple life, traditions & culture have overlapped & have become worse in Kashmir.
The author can be mailed at Reshifizzaaijaz@gmail.com
