Kashmiri Pandits ---- people with an eventful past

The Hindus from Kashmir, called Kashmiri Pandits (KP) are the aboriginal people of Kashmir with an uninterrupted history of thousands of years and the direct descendents of those highly awakened saints and sages of prehistoric times who lived a noble life here and left indelible impressions of their high spiritual achievements on this land. KP culture is enormously rich in terms of an established religious and social order with sound foundations laid and enriched from time to time by great saints and savants of the highest order for thousands of years. The uniqueness of the order thus established has been a source of great pride not only for the KPs but for the masses of the rest of India who treat Kashmir Hindu way of life a prime example in the field of religious and spiritual excellence. KP is the sole heir to this rich heritage inherited by them directly from their forefathers developed through a long history of their Tapasya and Sadhana. For a long time Kashmir enjoyed a prosperous and peaceful environment under Hindu rulers and was thus decorated with thousands of most beautiful Hindu temples and other institutions of learning so much so that numerous religious scholars came here to quench their thirst for knowledge, enjoy the beauty of the temples and visit her famous pilgrimage spots established through intense devotion of numerous highly awakened saints of yore. But unfortunately this prosperity and Hindu dominance did not last longer and in the early fourteenth century the face of this kingdom began to change rapidly with foreign influences trying to change the Hindu character forcefully with deceit and coercion so much so that within less than half a century most of the Hindus were converted to new faith and the rest were either killed or had fled for their lives. Hindus, now called Kashmir Pandits were reduced to a miniscule minority but they showed courage, withstood and tried adapting themselves to the new circumstances and preserving their cherished cultural heritage. Though they continued to be continuously under pressure to adopt the new found ways of life, they resisted strongly and didn’t compromise on the basic tenets of their ancient culture and faith. -------- (to be continued)