Floating Economies: The Cultural Ecology of the Dal Lake in Kashmir, India 9781800730304

Table of contents :
Contents
Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Acronyms
Notes on Text
Introduction
PART I
Chapter 1. Th e Valley of Kashmir and Dal Lake
Chapter 2. Kashmir’s Early History and the Conversion to Islam
Chapter 3. The Social Organization of Contemporary Kashmiri Muslim Society
Chapter 4. The Market Gardeners of Dal Lake: Early Accounts
Chapter 5. The Market Gardeners’ Economy Today
Chapter 6. Th e Productivity of Lacustrine Market Gardening
Chapter 7. The Houseboat Owner Community and the Development of Tourism on Dal Lake
Chapter 8. The Gad Hanz: Th e Last Fishers on the Dal
PART II
Chapter 9. Th e Degradation of the Dal: Causes and Impacts
Chapter 10. The Political Ecology of a Degrading Lake: A Paradise Lost?
Appendix A
Appendix B
References
Index

Citation preview

Floating Economies

Floating Economies The Cultural Ecology of the Dal Lake in Kashmir, India

 Michael J. Casimir

berghahn NEW YORK • OXFORD www.berghahnbooks.com

First published in 2021 by Berghahn Books www.berghahnbooks.com © 2021 Michael J. Casimir

All rights reserved. Except for the quotation of short passages for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without written permission of the publisher.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A C.I.P. cataloging record is available from the Library of Congress Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Control Number: 2020050423

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 978-1-80073-029-8 hardback ISBN 978-1-80073-030-4 ebook

For Hakim Shaukat Ali, a true friend for forty years. Without his support, this book would never have been written.

I understand nothing. . . . I don’t want to understand anything now. I want to stick to the fact. I made up my mind long ago not to understand. If I try to understand anything, I shall be false to the fact, and I have determined to stick to the fact. —Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov In the long run, structuralism teaches us to love and respect the ecology, because it is made up of living things, of plants and animals from which since it began, mankind did not only derive its sustenance but also, for such a long time, its deepest aesthetic feelings as well as its highest moral and intellectual speculations. —Lévi-Strauss 1972: 23

 Contents List of Illustrations

ix

Acknowledgments

xvi

List of Acronyms

xviii

Notes on Text

xx

Introduction

1

PART I Chapter 1. The Valley of Kashmir and Dal Lake

9

Chapter 2. Kashmir’s Early History and the Conversion to Islam

26

Chapter 3. The Social Organization of Contemporary Kashmiri Muslim Society

44

Chapter 4. The Market Gardeners of Dal Lake: Early Accounts

60

Chapter 5. The Market Gardeners’ Economy Today

81

Chapter 6. The Productivity of Lacustrine Market Gardening

117

Chapter 7. The Houseboat Owner Community and the Development of Tourism on Dal Lake

149

Chapter 8. The Gad Hanz: The Last Fishers on the Dal

177

PART II Chapter 9. The Degradation of the Dal: Causes and Impacts

189

Chapter 10. The Political Ecology of a Degrading Lake: A Paradise Lost?

217

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Contents

Appendix A

268

Appendix B

283

References

285

Index

309

 Illustrations Maps 1.1. The different parts of the region of Kashmir. Map by the author. 1.2. The Dal and Nageen Lakes with their raised fields, floating gardens, and lotus fields. Map courtesy of LAWDA. 1.3. The waterways in the valley of Kashmir with Srinagar and the Dal Lake. Source: Nouvelle géographie universelle: la terre et les hommes, 19 vols. (1875–1894). Vol. VIII, détail de L’Inde et l’IndoChine: 126–127. 4.1. Painted map of Srinagar and the Dal Lake (end of the seventeenth century). Courtesy City Palace Museum, Jaipur. 4.2. Detail from a Kashmir map shawl woven in about 1875 showing raised fields and floating gardens. Courtesy Victoria and Albert Museum, London. 4.3. Combined map adapted from Duke (1910) and Rushbrook (1883/1965). Map by the author. 5.1. Distribution of the most important mohallahs on the Dal Lake. Map by the author. Own enquiry and DPR 2000. Figures 1.1. Annual average precipitation and average maxima and minima of temperature. Calculated from data published in TuTiempo.net. 3.1. Nesting positions of the different communities of Kashmiris. Figure by the author. 4.1. The floating “raft-gardens” of Dal Lake (1881). Source: Ermens 1881: 329. 4.2. The arrangement of floating gardens. Redrawn sketch from Ermens (1881). 4.3. The floating gardens of the Dal (1866). Courtesy Shaukat Wani, Srinagar, private collection.

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5.1. A section from the Landsat scene, showing houses, gardens and raised fields. Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. 5.2. a, b. A cluster of hamlets with adjacent raised fields and lotus gardens 1965 and 2011. Source: The KH-7 surveillance system July 1963 to June 1967 and Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. 5.3. Annual variation of influx to the Dal 1985 to 1998. Graph by the author calculated from DPR 2000: table 2.13. 5.4. Monthly precipitation averages for Srinagar (1973–2009). Graph by the author. 5.5. Monthly average discharge from the Telbal Nala into the Dal (1985–1998). Graph by the author, calculated from DPR 2000: table 2.14. 6.1. Ranked distribution of ownership (ha) of agricultural land and/ or lotus gardens. Graph by the author, calculated from DPR 2000: table 2.14. 6.2. Relation between number of households and ownership of arable land (ha). Source: Department of Agriculture, Srinagar. 6.3. Kinship relations in a family showing a case of an adoption and a khānadāmād/dukhtār-i-khāna nashin marriage. Figure by the author. 6.4. False-color image of the Dal Lake and adjacent areas. Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. 6.5. Classification of the Dal Lake and adjacent areas using remote sensing data. Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. 6.6.a, b. Classification of the framed area in figure 6.4. Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. 6.7. Classification of water areas in the main region where lotus are cultivated. Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. 6.8a. Monthly availability and market price for all-season vegetables. Figure by the author. 6.8b. Monthly availability of summer vegetables. Figure by the author. 6.8c. Monthly availability of cucurbits. Figure by the author. 6.8d. Monthly availability of lotus rhizomes. Figure by the author. 6.9. Economic diversification in two market gardener families. Figure by the author.

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135 136 137 137 137 142

Illustrations •

6.10. Dependence of the Dal market gardeners’ economy on the lacustrine ecosystem, the products they generate, and their relation to the market. Figure by the author. 7.1. British sportsmen: “The way to the hunting grounds.” Source: The Graphic, 9 September, London 1882. Source: The Graphic, 9 September, London 1882. 7.2. Houseboat life in Kashmir . . . on the Thelum [ Jhelum] River. Source: The Graphic, 8 August, London 1891. 7.3. Ground plan of an upper-class houseboat. Figure by the author. 7.4. Periodicity of tourists coming to Kashmir registered at Srinagar airport. Source: Department of Tourism and Planning, Srinagar. Figure by the author. 7.5a, b. Number of Indian tourists visiting Kashmir in the years 1975 to 2002 and Number of foreign tourists visiting Kashmir in the years 1975 to 2002. Graphs by the author. Source: Department of Tourism and Planning, Srinagar. 7.6. Annual number of tourists staying on one houseboat from 2005 to 2017. Figure and data by the author. 7.7. Dependence of the houseboat owner’s family on tourists and the market. Figure by the author. 7.8. Marriage relations in three houseboat owner’s families. Figure by the author. 8.1. The total weight of fish (tons) caught in Dal Lake in the years 2010 to 2015. Source: Office of the Chief Project Officer Fisheries. Srinagar, Government of J&K. 8.2. The present economic situation of the Dal fishers. Figure by the author. 9.1a, b. Population growth 1823–2001 and expansion of Srinagar 1901–2000. Graphs by the author. Source: Primary Census Abstracts Jammu and Kashmir, published in Wani 2012: Table 2, p. 601. 9.2.a, b. A comparison of the situation north of the Dal Lake in 1965 and 2011. Sources: The KH-surveillance system July 1963 to June 1967 and for 2011, Copyright DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-0423T06. 9.3. Locations of water samples taken in 2013 and 2015. Authors own data and Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. 9.4. The measured conductivity (µS cm-1) in Dal and Nageen Lakes. Graph by the author. 9.5. Concentration of Ca, Mg, and K (mg/l) in the Telbal Nala and on their way through the Dal. Graph by the author.

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9.6. Concentration of N and P (mg/l) in the Telbal Nala through different areas of Dal and Nageen Lakes, to the Dal Gate. Figure by the author. 204 9.7. The increment of nitrogen/nitrate and phosphate in the years 1977, 2000, and 2008. Graph by the author based on data compiled by Qadri and Yousuf 2008, Table 1. 205 9.8.a, b. The monthly distribution of nitrate and total phosphorus concentration at different sites. Graph by the author based on data obtained from Mushtaq et al. 2013, Table 1. 206 9.9.a–d. The distribution and expansion of yellow water lilies over parts of Dal Lake in 2004, 2011, 2015, and 2020. Source: Google Earth. 207 9.10. The interrelation between submerged macrophytes, sedimentation, sediment processing, and the availability nutrients. Figure by the author adapted from Barko and James 1998: 199. 210 9.11. The interrelated effects of silting, sewage, aquatic macrophytes, and encroachment. Figure by the author. 213 10.1. The rise in the number of articles published in Greater Kashmir, Kashmir Times, and Kashmir Observer. Graph by the author. 220 10.2. Number of plots allotted per month to Dal dwellers in Rakhi-Arath between August 2010 and April 2017. Graph by the author based on data courtesy of J & K Lakes and Waterways Development Authorities, LAWDA, Srinagar. 243 10.3. The 2005 Houseboat Owners Association layout for relocating and realigning houseboats. Source: Courtesy HBOA. 247 10.4. Detail of the Houseboat Owner Association’s new layout for realigning houseboats. Source: Courtesy HBOA. 248 Images 1.1.a, b. Old dungas and the last bahātsh on the Jehlum River. Photo by the author. 1.2. The Resident Commissioner’s parandh (long boat) on river Jhelum1866. Courtesy Shaukat Wani, Srinagar, private collection. 3.1. Poster showing Iranian leaders next to the Floating Market. Photo by the author. 4.1. Floating gardens at the end of the nineteenth century. Courtesy Shaukat Wani, Srinagar, private collection. 5.1. A small two-year-old raised field in spring. Photo by the author. 5.2. A roughly three-year-old raised field ready to be cultivated. Photo by the author. 5.3. Old floating gardens used to encircle an area to make a raised field. Photo by the author.

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Illustrations •

5.4. A roughly twenty-year-old raised field with the new growth of winter vegetables. Photo by the author. 5.5.a, b. A lifting lever and the big iron pot traditionally used for irrigation. Photos by the author. 5.6. Harvesting the hil (Ceratophyllum demersum). Photo by the author. 5.7. Bringing the hil to the fields. Photo by the author. 5.8. Waterweeds piled up to make compost. Photo by the author. 5.9. Working the compost into the soil. Photo by the author. 5.10. Nets, khashū to lift mud and water plants from the lake’s bottom. Photo by the author. 5.11. A newly fabricated floating garden (2017). Photo by the author. 5.12. One of the floating gardens in summer 2018. Photo courtesy Sulfkar Nagoo. 5.13. Molding tulche out of waterweeds mixed with mud. Photo by the author. 5.14. Making pōkurs on a rād. Photo by the author. 5.15. Young gourds growing out of pōkurs. Photo by the author. 5.16. Inserting the tulche with the young plants into the pōkurs in the littoral zone. Photo by the author. 5.17. Stakes inserted into the rād to support climbers. Photo by the author. 5.18. Stakes tied together to form a lattice on which climbers can cling. Photo by the author. 5.19. Detaching the rād from the lake’s bottom with a liwan. Photo by the author. 5.20 a–c. Moving the floating rād to a new location. Photos by the author. 5.21. Mooring the rād at its new location. Photo by the author. 5.22. A lotus garden demarcated by rāds in early spring before the lotus plants emerge. Photo by the author. 5.23. The same garden in summer covered with lotus plants. Photo by the author. 5.24. Pulling up the lotus rhizomes with a nadir chomb. Photo by the author. 5.25. The special hook attached to a rod (chomb) for pulling up lotus rhizomes. Photo by the author. 5.26. Selling lotus pods and gourds at the roadside. Photo by the author. 5.27. Partly submerged free-floating rād during a high water level in May 2010. Photo by the author. 5.28. Sliced bottle gourds hung up to dry. Photo by the author.

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5.29. Bringing home reeds and water lily leaves as animal feed. Photo by the author. 5.30. Weaving mats (wagu) from the leaves of the lesser bulrush. Photo by the author. 6.1. A nursery being prepared for sowing different vegetables. Photo by the author. 6.2. Fields on an island prepared for the cultivation of winter vegetables. Photo by the author. 6.3.a–c. The bottle gourd, the bitter gourd, and the ridge gourd. Photos by the author. 6.4. The Floating Vegetable Market. Photo by the author. 6.5. Tourist shops on stilts near the Floating Vegetable Market. Photo by the author. 7.1. Simple dunga houseboats on the Jhelum River on which poorer families live. Photo by the author. 7.2. A “doonga houseboat” hosting tourists on the Dal Lake (about 1920). Source: Meyer-Illmersdorf 1926. 7.3. Entrance of a “doong houseboat” for tourists in the early twentieth century. Source: Petrocokino 1920. 7.4. Modern houseboats lined up in the southern part of Dal Lake. Photo by the author. 7.5. A comfortable houseboat with attached pile-constructed house. Photo by the author. 7.6. A luxurious “deluxe” class houseboat on the Nageen Lake. Photo by the author. 7.7. The living room in an upper-class houseboat. Photo by the author. 7.8. A bedroom in an upper-class houseboat. Photo by the author. 7.9. Taking pictures of tourists dressed up as a “Kashmiri prince and princess.” Photo by the author. 7.10. Displaying and selling jewelry to a tourist family on a houseboat. Photo by the author. 7.11. A traditional talim from Kashmir. Photo by the author. 7.12a, b. The final application of a floral design on a box lid. Photos by the author. 7.13. Displaying lacquered objects to a tourist on the veranda of a houseboat. Photo by the author. 8.1. A traditional fisher settlement on the northeastern shore of Dal Lake. Photo by the author. 8.2. Throwing the cast net to catch small and medium-sized species. Photo by the author.

112 114 125 126 127 139 141 153 154 155 157 158 160 160 161 166 167 169 171 172 178 178

Illustrations •

8.3 a, b. Drying small fish in the sun to be sold in the market. Photos by the author. 8.4. The harpoon (nāruṭsh) used to catch big fish—nowadays mainly carp. Photo by the author. 9.1a, b. Typical conditions in the canals in the Old City. Photos by the author. 9.2. The floating ferns: A Salvinia natans plant surrounding Azolla christata. Photo by the author. 10.1a, b. A sewage treatment plant installed in about 2013 east of the Nagen Lake. Photo by the author. 10.2. Mechanical cutting of waterweeds with a harvester. Photo by the author. 10.3. A signboard leading to the Rakh-i-Arath colony (August 2015). Photo by the author. 10.4. Some of the half-ready houses built for rehabilitated Dal dwellers at Rakh-i-Arath. Photo by the author. 10.5. “Kashmir Concern.” Courtesy Touseef Ahmed Bhatt, Srinagar. Tables 1.1. Physical and morphological dimensions of the Dal Lake. Table by the author based on data published by ILEC (2011). 1.2. The different biotopes/habitats of the lake area and of the catchment. Table by the author based on data published by Khan (2000: 97). 5.1. Concentration of some nutrients, conductivity, and pH values in water samples. Table by the author. 5.2. pH value and concentrations of some minerals in a mixed sample of compost. Table by the author. 6.1. Vegetables raised and harvested at all seasons and those harvested only in summer. Table by the author. 6.2. Annual yield of some important vegetables on the Dal lake islands and raised fields. Table by the author. 6.3. Total and water areas (ha) of the different parts where lotus rhizomes are mainly cultivated. Table by the author. 6.4. Prices of vegetables on the Floating Market and in Srinagar greengroceries. Table by the author.

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 Acknowledgments My research on the Dal Lake in Kashmir would have never been possible without the help of many people. First of all, my deepest gratitude goes to my friend Hakim Shaukat Ali. Without his network of friends in Srinagar and on Dal Lake, I would never have gained access to so much of the information I needed. Next, of course, I thank all my friends on the lake who allowed me to participate in their lives in the years from 2009 to 2017. Here I especially wish to mention the family of Hamid, Jaqub, and Masjeed Dunoo, who own the houseboat moored on Nagin Lake where I lived. They provided me with not only comfortable accommodation but also much information about the lake dwellers and especially the houseboat owner community. Furthermore, I must acknowledge the contribution of the many families of market gardeners who helped me to understand the complex system of growing vegetables on their islands, raised fields, and famous floating gardens. Fieldwork on the lake would also have been very difficult without the help of my friend and knowledgeable counterpart Sulfikar Ali, the owner of a shikara, one of the gondola-like water taxis, who brought me to the more remote places of the Dal. In Srinagar, many organizations provided me with valuable information and data. Here I especially wish to thank Mohamad Yousuf Dar IAS, commissioner, Survey and Land Records; Syed Altaf Ajaz Andrabi, director, Rakhs and Farms, Department of Agriculture, Jammu and Kashmir; Farooq Ahmed Factoo, director, Census Operations; Shafaat Noor Barlas (VC) J&K Lakes and Waterways Authority (LAWDA); and last but not least, Yaqub Dunoo, chairperson of the Houseboat Owner’s Association. With her in-depth knowledge and understanding of Kashmir’s history— especially of the political and social changes that have taken place in the region since 1947—Nathalène Reynolds greatly helped me to comprehend the present sociocultural and political situation in many discussions.

Acknowledgments

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Many of my friends and colleagues in Germany and abroad supported my work: Iris Hindersman, Katrin Matern, and Karin Greef (Department of Geography, University of Cologne) kindly analyzed the nutrients in samples of water, waterweeds, compost, and soil. I am most grateful to Andreas Bolten (Department of Geography, University of Cologne) who analyzed the remote sensing data, and I am especially grateful to the Indologist Walter Slaje (Department of Indology, University of Halle, Germany) who helped me to grasp the complex field of Kashmir’s early history through his profound knowledge of classical texts. To Ravi Rao I am grateful for calculating the monthly minima, maxima, and averages of temperature and precipitation from the daily climate data in the years between 1973 and 2009. For many discussions and important suggestions and advice, I thank Peter Andrews, Konstantin Behrend, Sonja Esters, Kurt Falkenberg, Thomas Helmich, Berthold Riese, and especially Mirijam Zickel and Hauke-Peter Vehrs (who also kindly helped when my computer and I were on bad terms). Last but not least, I thank Monika Feinen, who drew the maps and figures, and Astrid Hegemann, the librarian of my department, who found and obtained even the most “exotic” books and articles I needed. I am also grateful for the helpful comments supplied by three anonymous referees. Needless to say, I alone am responsible for any factual errors, faulty logic, or lack of cogency in the various chapters that follow. Fieldwork was carried out in the years 2009 to 2017 with the exception of 2014. I distributed the months and weeks of fieldwork on the Dal Lake in such a way that, with the exception of the winter months between November and January, I could observe the agrarian cycle of the market gardeners several times. Interviews with the owners of houseboats and with different officers and heads of departments, organizations, and institutions were made in English; those with the market gardeners on the lake were conducted in Urdu and mixed especially with special Kashmiri terms for their agricultural activities. For more complex interviews, when my Urdu was not sufficient, Hussain Baba kindly helped. My special thanks, however, are due to the German Research Foundation (DFG) that generously financed my research in Kashmir.

 Acronyms ADB AMRUT AUT BCB BRICS CAG CCTV CE CS DPR EMP FAB GK HC HBOA HU&DD IGP IIT J&K KO KR KT LAWDA

Asian Development Bank Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation J & K State Pollution Control Board Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa Comptroller and Auditor-General Close Circuit Television Camber Committee on Environment Chief Secretary Detailed Project Report (Vols. I & II) Environment Management Plan Fluidized Aerobic Bio-Reactor Greater Kashmir High Court ( J & K) Houseboat Owners Association Housing & Urban Development Department Inspector General Police Indian Institute of Technology Jammu and Kashmir Kashmir Observer Kashmir Reader Kashmir Times Lake and Waterways Development Authorities

Acronyms

MC MSC NC NEERI NIUA NLCP PC PCB RK SBR SPCB SMC SPCB STP UEED UNDP VC

Monitoring Committee Srinagar Municipal Corporation National Conference Party National Environmental Engineering Research Institute National Institute of Urban Affairs National Lake Conservation Plan Planning Commission Pollution Control Board Rising Kashmir Sequential Batch Reactor State Pollution Control Board Srinagar Municipal Corporation State Pollution Control Board Sewage Treatment Plant Urban Environment Engineering Department United Nations Development Program Vice Chairman

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 Notes on Text Kashmiri (Koshur/Koshir in their own language) belongs to the Dardic branch of Indo-Arian languages. Most of the distinct vocabulary used by Hindus is derived from Sanskrit and that used by Muslims is derived from Perso-Arabic sources. Alongside some regional dialectal differences, Kachru (2004: 343) differentiates Kashmiri spoken in the city of Srinagar (shara koshur) from that spoken in the villages (gāma kashur) and also that spoken on the Dal. The latter reveals many differences compared to the Kashmiri spoken in the city (for a comprehensive analysis of the language, see Koul 2003). Originally, Kashmiri had its own script (Śāradā) developed around the tenth century. Later, this was replaced by Devanagari. After the advent of Islam in the fourteenth century, Kashmiri was mostly written in the PersoArabic script. For many decades and mainly for religio-political reasons, Kashmiri was not taught in schools, and Urdu became more and more important. As a result, Kashmiri gradually became only a spoken language. Nowadays, not many people are able to write Kashmiri, and all official forms and letters, private or personal, are written in either Urdu or English. It is only since 2008 that the Kashmiris’ own language is being taught again in all schools in the valley. Three Kashmiri dictionaries are available: the most comprehensive is by Grierson and Shastri (1916); others were published by Elmsly (1872) and Neve, E.F. (1977). Grierson and Shastri’s dictionary documents mainly the “High Kashmiri” spoken among the Hindus (Pandits) that is quite different from the Kashmiri spoken by Muslims. As a result, it does not list many of the words I collected on the lake. Over the years, different scholars have also used different diacritical signs to represent the sound system of the Kashmiri language. Especially Grierson and Shastri’s transcription is extremely difficult. For instance, the term for

Notes on Text

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the vegetable gardeners on the Dal islands is transcribed as ḍēmb-hönzü; that for the turnip cultivated by these people, as ḍēmba-gŏg üj ü. For ease of reading, I have rendered these terms into Demb Hanz and gōg ji. Also, for example, the Kashmiri word for the traditional small houseboat is transcribed in the dictionaries mentioned above as well as in various books and articles as dunga, dúnga, dūnga, doonga, ḍūnga, ḍǖnga, or ḍũnga. Here I shall simply transcribe this as dunga. Fortunately, a comprehensible grammar of the Kashmiri language including a description of the sound system was recently published by Koul and Wali (2015). I follow the transcription system in that work, apart from some minor modifications in order to adapt it to the local variety of Kashmiri at issue in this study. Here, only five vowels are distinguished in short (a, e, i, o, u) and lengthened (ā, ē, ī, ō, ū) versions. Besides the unaspirated consonants, aspirated ones include ph, ṭh, and kh. The retroflexes include ṛ, ḍ, ṭ, and the aspirated ṭh. The affricates (c, ts) are differentiated from their aspirated counterparts (ch and tsh) and from the palatal fricative (sh). In general, I follow Koul and Wali (2015: vi); but to keep things simple, I confine myself to the symbols indicated above and disregard further particularities. For a comprehensive and detailed account, see Koul and Wali (2015: vi and 11–37). All scientific names of plants and animals are italicized along with the terms used by the lake dwellers. If a term is not Kashmiri, it is annotated with an *, indicating that it is borrowed from either Urdu, Hindi, or English. The owners of houseboats who are constantly in contact with foreigners from different countries and from other Indian states in which Hindi/Urdu is not spoken use English; and with most North Indian guests, they speak Urdu or Hindi. All names of contemporary individuals and those from the more recent past as well as geographical terms are written in their Anglicized form without diacritical signs. Thus the term for a canal, a mountain stream nāllah*, is written as nala (e.g., Telbal Nala). Also, familiar Islamic terms such as Shī’a are written as Shia along with Shiites and Shiism, and Quran is used for Qur’ān.

 Introduction After decades of research on human-environmental interactions, anthropology, and more particularly environmental anthropology, suddenly finds itself pushed into prominence. A vibrant and kaleidoscopic research agenda has ensued and borrowed extensively from other disciplines. This agenda coincides with increased interest in coupled human and natural systems from both the social and natural sciences. Such attention is not solely the product of academic integration or the analytical reflection of empirical realities; it also stems from growing concern over the role of humans in the global transformation of the environment. —Orr, Lansing, and Dove 2015: 153

It was in the summer of 1981, when Aparna Rao and I first started our research among the Bakkarwal pastoral nomads in Kashmir, that I first saw Dal Lake. We spent some days on a houseboat and explored the different parts of the lake in one of the gondola-like water taxies, the shikaras. In those days, the lake to me seemed to be simply beautiful with its clear fresh water, patches of waterlilies, and lovely lotus fields. We saw the small hamlets of the vegetable gardeners, the artificially constructed small islands with their fields, and the floating gardens, those stretches of reeds on which different sorts of cucurbits were ripening. Back home, to our great astonishment, we found that no anthropological research had ever been undertaken on the lake dwellers and their habitat, and we thought that this could be our next fieldwork. In 2009, now alone, I started this new project with the idea of describing and analyzing the construction and use of this unique hydroponic floating garden economy. But during my subsequent stays, I became more and more aware of the complex intermeshing of ecology and economy, of the social and political factors determining the livelihood of the mainly Shia market gardeners. However, there were also Sunni houseboat owners accommodating tourists from all over the world, as well as some small fisher settlements. So I also

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Floating Economies

became interested in these communities, finally deciding to put into practice the holistic and multidisciplinary approach called for so often and to try and describe Dal Lake as a complex sociopolitical and economic system against the backdrop of the lacustrine ecology. I also noticed that, in contrast to a number of publications on late Paleolithic and Neolithic stilt house settlements (e.g., Menotti 2004; Menotti and O’Sullivan 2003), to the best of my knowledge, very few cultural anthropologists1 and geographers have engaged in the study of populations living directly or indirectly with and from lakes. Whereas innumerable books and articles deal with the cultural ecology of past and present hunter gatherers; of pastoral, agricultural, or maritime cultures; and of populations living at high altitudes, the cultural ecology of lake dwellers was barely a topic. Also, whereas there are hundreds of publications on the different ecological zones and habitats—last but not least in the context of “climate change”—the importance of lakes is rarely a focus of interest. In 2011, the outstanding importance of lakes was articulated at the fourteenth World Lake Conference in Austin, Texas, organized by the International Lake Environment Committee Foundation (ILEC) and the River Systems Institute (RSI) of Texas State University: One estimate is that there are more than 10 million lakes with a surface area of one hectare or greater. They contain more than 90 percent of the liquid freshwater on the surface of our planet at any given instant.2 We use them for more purpose than any other water system, including drinking and irrigation water supply, industrial needs, sports and commercial fisheries, recreation, hydropower generation, and human and commercial transportation. They provide a range of ecosystem goods and services to humanity. They also represent major habitats and natural ecosystems. They have religious or spiritual significance in many cultures. Finally, they represent some of the most picturesque features of our global landscape. (RSI 2011: Invitation letter)

In the following years and after several more stays on the lake, during which I gained a degree of basic knowledge about the economy and social structure of the three populations on the Dal, some of my informants mentioned that they believe that it is only in recent centuries that people began to live on the lake. This triggered my interest in the history of the Vale, and I wanted to try and find out when the lake first became populated by market gardeners and later by owners of tourist houseboats. I worked my way through the early historical sources—the translated and published Sanskrit, Persian, and Urdu manuscripts—and read the discussions among historians about their verisimilitude. Then, for the later period, I also read the many books written by European, mainly British, explorers and travelers. I realized that the question when humans first inhabited the Dal could be

Introduction

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addressed only by understanding the complex history, the transformation from a Hindu to an Islamic society, the permanent strife between Sunnis and Shias in later years, and the effects all this had on the fate of the different populations in the valley. Nonetheless, the main part of the book deals with the socioeconomic strategies of the three communities, the ecological condition of the Dal, and the reasons for its increasing degradation. The book is organized into two parts. Part I starts with a brief introduction to “The Valley of Kashmir and Dal Lake,” giving basic information on the geography and ecology of the lake and its surroundings. The next two chapters deal with “Kashmir’s Early History and the Conversion to Islam” followed by “The Social Organization of Contemporary Kashmiri Muslim Society.” The fourth chapter, “The Market Gardeners of Dal Lake: Early Accounts,” presents an educated guess as to when the wetlands and lakes first became populated and sketches the rise of the market gardeners’ economy on the Dal. The following chapter, “The Market Gardeners’ Economy Today,” describes the contemporary complex economy and livelihood of the gardeners in detail. It shows how, through their different modes of production, they minimize the uncertainties and risks of life in this hazardous lacustrine environment in order to achieve a fairly stable subsistent economy. The next chapter, “The Productivity of Lacustrine Market Gardening,” follows this up by describing the annual agrarian cycle and estimating the productivity of the market gardeners’ economy using interpretations of satellite images together with ground truth data on acreages, ownership of land, and the carrying capacities of the land, the floating gardens, and the lotus fields. The data obtained show the importance of the gardeners’ vegetable production for the Kashmiri capital Srinagar and its periphery. These data then form the basis for the chapters in the second part of the book. The chapters on the market gardeners and their economy are followed by an exposition on “The Houseboat Owner Community and the Development of Tourism on Dal Lake.” In contrast to the quite early presence of market gardeners on the Dal, houseboat building and tourism began only toward the end of the nineteenth century. The chapter narrates the step-by-step evolution from the small traditional Kashmiri houseboat, the dunga, to the larger boats for traveling British colonial civil servants and tourists. It was only at the beginning of the twentieth century that the first large and luxurious houseboats were built that can still be seen moored on the Dal. Unlike the relatively self-subsistent market gardeners, the owners of houseboats depend completely on the annual influx of tourists—something that is highly unpredictable due not only to climatic change but also and mainly to the

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frequent periods of political unrest when only a few visitors dare to come to Kashmir. This is followed by chapter eight, “The Gad Hanz: The Last Fishers on the Dal,” describing the fisher communities and their traditional methods for catching and conserving the different species of fish. Since the early twentieth century, however, their livelihood has changed dramatically. Not only has the snow trout (Schizothorax niger), a much-relished endemic species, become very rare, but the population of other fish species has also declined due to the ongoing degradation of the Dal. Now, except for some small species, the only fish still caught are the carp introduced in 1955. They have multiplied dramatically, thereby endangering even more endemic species. In contrast to the nineteenth century, only very few members of the fisher community work as full-time fishers nowadays, and their families can survive only because some members have taken jobs in the city and away from the lake. Also, in recent years, many families have been rehoused some distance from the Dal, bringing their traditional means and modes of production to an end. Part II of the book goes on to address the ecological situation of Dal Lake. Compared to a period as recent as the 1980s, the lake’s ecology has deteriorated greatly due to more and more pollution, leading to increasing eutrophication and decreasing biodiversity. This is analyzed in the chapter “The Degradation of the Dal: Causes and Impacts,” which presents limnologic and hydrological data showing the causes for the accelerating degradation of the Dal. It describes the different strategies and measures implemented by governmental institutions to halt the lake’s deterioration or even to restore the so-often-invoked “past glory of the Dal.” This chapter is followed by “The Political Ecology of a Degrading Lake: A Paradise Lost?” By analyzing and partly quoting the hundreds of articles published by Kashmiri ecologists and critical journalists, this final chapter discloses how and why no progress can be seen despite the enormous amount of money allocated to the institutions concerned. Most measures in the “Save the Lake Project” have failed—either because they were designed wrongly due to ecological and/or technological ignorance or because they are not being pursued consistently due to administrative and stakeholder rivalries and corruption. This continues to be the case despite innumerable High Court orders repeatedly commanding the different institutions to implement meaningful and effective measures. The chapter highlights and explains the constant mismanagement of the project to restore the “pristine beauty of the Dal.” It analyzes the corrupt ties between powerful high-ranking officers in the institutions involved in the “Save the Dal Lake Project” and wealthy stakeholders—sometimes also hand in hand with powerful members of the political parties. The last short paragraph finally deals with the relationship between “pollution and Islam.”

Introduction

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It points out that despite Kashmiri society being based on the Islamic canon as the fundament of all decisions and deeds, the pollution of Dal Lake is unfortunately understood solely as a sociopolitical and economic issue and is not related to environmental aspects of Islam. This book is the outcome of fieldwork carried out between 2009 and 2017. In this period—with the exception of 2014—I spent one to two months on the lake every year. I organized my stays in such a way that I could observe the agricultural activities two or three times throughout each and every season except for the lean months between November and February. The book should be understood as a cultural and ecological narrative about the past, present, and probably the last phase of the long enduring agony of the “world famous Dal Lake”, the “Jewel of Kashmir”. If the lake dies, the loss will not just be economic: a unique ecosystem and a fascinating facet of Kashmir’s traditional cultural heritage will be gone forever.

Notes 1. But see Altner (2009), Cleland (1982), Levieil and Orlove (1990), Orlove (e.g., 1991, 2002), or Thesiger (1964). For the agricultural use of river islands in South Asia (chars), see Lahiri-Dutt and Samanta (2013). 2. See especially Messager et al. (2016).

PART

I



1  The Valley of Kashmir and Dal Lake “Paradise on Earth,” the “Switzerland of Asia,” and the “Venice of the East” Agar firdaus bar ruye zamīn ast, hamīn ast o hamīn ast, o hamīn ast [If a paradise on earth exists, it is here, it is here (certainly), it is here]. —Couplet from 16191 by the Persian poet Amir Khusrau, inscribed in the Black Pavilion in the Shālimār Gardens. Who has not heard of the vale of Cashmere, With its roses the brightest that earth ever gave, Its temples, and grottos, and fountains as clear As the love-lighted eyes that hang over their wave? —Thomas Moore, Lalla Rookh

Since time immemorial, the Vale of Kashmir, surrounded by high snow-covered mountains, dense forests, lush pastures, and beautiful lakes and cities, has always been viewed as paradise on earth. Puranic texts of the seventh and eighth centuries, the Nīlamata Purāṇa and the Viṣṇudharmottara Purāṇa, already understood such a paradise on earth as an icon of the “higher paradise,” the abode of the gods (devaloka). It was imagined as a place located at the center of a kingdom with an enclosure and a divine citadel placed on an island in the middle of a river surrounded by hills and mountains in an auspicious landscape (Inden 2008: 525). The second connotation of a paradise on earth pertains to a pristine and auspicious landscape: this was, as Inden writes, “a terrain (bhūmi) in the wilderness (vana) . . . near a lake or river-

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bank or sandbank or lotus pond, outside both the city and countryside.” It was a place for pilgrimages where temples or monasteries were built and Vedic sacrifices were performed; places that were “used less as places for pleasure than as sites where people could prepare themselves for liberation from everyday life” (Inden 2008: 525). Such a relation to an unspoiled wilderness with its auspicious purity was also a central theme in Kālidāsa’s classical Sanskrit drama Śakuntalā and the Ring of Recollection (Abhijñānaśākuntala), dating back to the fourth century, which had an enormous influence on European literature of the Romantic period.2 Another imagination of a paradise can be traced back to early Middle Eastern ideas, especially to those of the Persian Avesta. The concept of pairidaiza is an imagination that also found its way into the Christian faith. This Persian representation of a paradise was expressed in a quadripartite garden architecture centered on a fountain pond with a cascade and channels going off in all four directions. In Kashmir, the Mughal emperor Jahangir started to create such “paradises” for his wife Nur Jahan in 1619. The famous Mughal Gardens, Shalimar Bagh and Nishat Bagh, can still be admired on the northeastern bank of Dal Lake (for a detailed description and analysis, see Inden 2008: 547–52). In his book Travels in the Mogul Empire: A.D. 1656–1668, Bernier (1891) wrote a series of nine letters to M. de Merveilles titled “Journey to Kachemire, The Paradise of the Indies” (see also Bano 1991), an eponym that subsequently found its way into almost every European account of Kashmir. For the colonialists in India, this “exotic splendor” was not the main reason for visiting the valley of Kashmir, which they often referred to as the “Happy Valley.” With its capital Srinagar on the banks of Dal Lake surrounded by its snow-covered mountains and with its hundreds of waterways, Kashmir reminded the British of romantic European places, and thus the valley was often referred to as the “Switzerland of Asia,” and Srinagar was called the “Venice of the East.” These terms found their way into most books published in the first half of the nineteenth century, written mainly by British travelers who usually went there for hunting3 and normally took little interest in the Kashmiri people and their culture. Typical for the general attitude toward the country are the accounts of William Wilson (1875: 341), who, after having visited Srinagar, described it briefly as follows: “You have now been through the best part of the capital of Cashmere, and what is there to look at? When you come to ask yourself the question, absolutely nothing.” Regarding the climate of the country, he then wrote, “The climate was perfection—a pleasanter one is impossible to conceive; and if there is a place in India intended by providence for colonization with Europeans, that place is doubtless Cashmere.”4 Moreover, nearly all the descriptions of Kashmir and the “Happy Valley” referred, alongside the environmental splendor, only to the “rich and

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mighty” with whom the travelers came into closer contact.5 These were not afflicted by, and rarely became victims of, the devastating earthquakes (as in 1885, Neve 1913: 37–43), fires, and famines. Especially cholera and smallpox epidemics (Sharma 1983: 42) were a constant threat to the inhabitants of Srinagar. In April 1925, for example, as Mayo (1927: 330) reported, cholera had killed 2 percent of the entire population of the state.6 Neve (1913: 44–45) wrote in his report, “The wonder is, not that cholera came, but that it never went away; not that it slew 10,000 victims, but that so many escaped its ravage. . . . Enough that cholera came and will come again, aye, and again, as long as it is thus prepared for, and invited and feasted by a city reared on filth, a people born in filth, living in filth and drinking filth” (see also Khan 1978: 19–25). As in many countries in colonial times, Kashmir (which was not part of British India7) also revealed two parallel worlds: a ruling class and the British on the one side and the impoverished masses on the other. For the nobility, the British colonialists, as well as a few very rich Kashmiris, this beautiful valley surely was a paradise, but for most of the ordinary people it was, more often than not, closer to hell. The difference between these two worlds becomes especially pronounced when it is considered that in the very same year in which Neve reported on the horrible cholera outbreak that raged in Srinagar, the first comfortable houseboats on Dal Lake were constructed mainly for British officers who (often with their families) wanted to escape the hot summer months in the Indian plains. They then spent their time in the cool climate on the lake amusing themselves with what they called “the sports”: shooting animals in the romantic mountainous hinterlands (Sanyal 1979: 26). These last years of the nineteenth century and first years of the twentieth marked the beginning of well-organized tourism in Kashmir, and it can also not be denied, as Bruce (1911: 31) wrote, that “the numbers of travelers who pour into the country every year during the summer months are doing a great service to Kashmir. They bring in money, and they encourage here trades in exchange for pleasure and health.” The idea that the Vale of Kashmir stands for a “paradise on earth” never faded and was revived especially at the end of the twentieth century when the focus of touristic interest in foreign countries changed: “The new ventures occur in the tourist circuits where explorers in the late twentieth century are willing to buy not only the products but also the experience of life in all its exotic splendor” (Nash 2000: 129). More and more tourist guidebooks for traveling in Kashmir were published (the most famous were Duke 1910 and Neve n.d. ), and most travel books and accounts from this period mirrored the romantic attitude toward the country.8 This romantic image not only found its way to the West but also established itself in the minds of the people of India. As a result, the legendary fame of Kashmir’s beauty has

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persisted until today, a fact that is evident from the many romantic scenes in Indian films set in the valley. After independence and the partition of the subcontinent in 1947, British tourism came largely to a halt, and in the following times of war, India and Pakistan fought over the region that, until today, is divided into different zones of influence (map 1.1). It was only roughly during the 1960s and 1970s that Kashmir experienced another onset of tourism when especially Western travelers were looking for a beautiful and unspoiled environment, and the valley of Kashmir with Dal Lake again became an important destination. But the political problems in this disputed area were never resolved, and in the 1980s and 1990s, at the apex of the Kashmiri independence struggle with militant attacks and bloody counterstrikes by the Indian army, tourism again came to a standstill. It is only recently that the situation in the valley has calmed down somewhat and tourism has started to pick up again. Dal Lake, with its hundreds of

Map 1.1. The different parts of the region of Kashmir. Map by the author.

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houseboats, narrow waterways between picturesque islands, fields of flowering lotus, and floating vegetable gardens, is once again becoming a favored destination for many Indian and Western tourists. But the thriving tourism on Dal Lake is just one recent aspect reflecting the paramount importance of the lakes, rivers, and canals that have always been the lifelines of the whole region.

Dal Lake and Its Ecology: The Basics Perhaps in the whole world there is no corner so pleasant as the Dal lake. —Lawrence 1895: 21

The subalpine Himalayan Dal Lake, or simply “Dal,” is situated in the eastern part of the valley of Kashmir (34˚6' N and 34˚10' N latitude, 74˚50' E and 74˚54' E longitude) at an altitude of about 1,584 meters above sea level, covering an area of about 11.5 kilometers.2 The lake is surrounded by some agricultural land, but the shores are occupied mostly by hotels and other buildings (for details, see Wani 2013; Wani and Khairkar 2011). Srinagar, the summer capital of the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir ( J & K), stretches mainly along the lake’s western shore; thus, the Dal is often referred to as an urban lake (map 1.2). The lake is subdivided into four basins from north to south: Hazaratbal, Boddal, the Nageen (in old maps also called “Sudar Khun”), and Gagribal. The latter, with a maximum depth of only 2.5 meters, is the shallowest; whereas the Nageen, with a maximum depth of about 6 meters, is the deepest (see, e.g., Jeelani and Shah 2006: 13). Summarizing the data published by many authors, ILEC (2011) gives the following physical and morphometric dimensions: Table 1.1. Physical and morphological dimensions of the Dal Lake. Table by the author based on data published by ILEC (2011). Surface area:

21 km2 (including floating gardens)

Volume

0.00983 km3

Maximum depth

6m

Mean depth

1.4 m, 2 m in the Nageen basin respectively

Water level

regulated

Normal range of annual water level fluctuations

0.7 m

Length of shoreline

15.5 km

Catchment area

316 km2

Names of main islands

Sona Lank and Rupa Lank

Inflow streams

Telbal, Boutkul, and Meerakshah Nala

Outflowing channels

Dal Gate, Nala Amir Khan

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Map 1.2. The Dal and Nageen Lakes with their raised fields, floating gardens, and lotus fields. Map courtesy of LAWDA.

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Khan (2000: 97) provides the following data on both the different biotopes/habitats and the catchment area: Table 1.2. The different biotopes/habitats of the lake area and of the catchment. Table by the author based on data published by Khan (2000: 97). Total lake area

2,100 ha

Open water

1,240 ha

Floating gardens

420 ha

Marsh

290 ha

Land

150 ha

Volume

17 x 106 m3

Depth (max)

6.0 m

Total Catchment area

31,600 ha

Datchigam

14,800 ha

Telbal

8,000 ha

Lake Hillside

4,700 ha

Srinagar North

1,200 ha

Srinagar Center

900 ha

Lake Interior

2,000 ha

In general, besides its different basins, the Dal can be differentiated roughly into the open water body and those parts, mainly in the west and southwest, consisting of marshy lands and numerous inhabited islands (map 1.2). These islands with their vegetable fields and artificially constructed “raised fields” are occupied not only by market gardeners, who also cultivate the floating gardens and the lotus fields,9 but also by families whose members work in other crafts/trades onshore and on the lake. The climatic data for Srinagar (fig. 1.1) show warm summers with average temperatures of about 25o C between May and September and cold winters with temperatures around the freezing point. Average summer maxima reach 30o C and average winter minima reach -3o C.10 The precipitation data show two peaks, one between mid-February and April and another one between mid-June and July. The main source of inflow to the Dal is through the perennial Telbal Nala, a mountain stream that has its catchment in the Datchigam area north of the lake. Drained from this region with an extension between 145 kilometers2 ( Jeelani and Shah 2006: 13) and 234.17 kilometers2 (DRP 2000: 1:80), it contributes between 70 and 80 percent of the total inflow into the lake (ENEX 1978; Trisal 1987; ) and transports most of the mineral nutrients to the Dal.

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Figure 1.1. Annual average precipitation and average maxima and minima of temperature. Calculated from data published in TuTiempo.net.

Some other rivulets originate in the same area. Additionally, some springs at the bottom of the lake also supply it with water. Due to the slight tilt of the region, the water entering the Dal in the north passes through the different basins and drains out of the lake through the Dal Gate, a sluice gate in the south of the Gagribal basin, from which it then flows off into the Jhelum River. From Nageen Lake, the water drains off through the Amir Khan Nala and finally into Wular Lake in the north of the valley.

A Short Note on Dal Lake’s Biome The biome or biocenosis of an ecosystem describes the plant–animal formation in a given habitat. Kaul and Zutshi (1967) and Trisal (1987) have identified 107 emergent, submerged, and floating plant species in the different basins of the Dal, 18 of which are floating and 13 submerged. Here, without claiming to be exhaustive, I will name only the most conspicuous plants and animals—those that are also important for the lake dwellers (for a comprehensive account, see Pandit 1984). As mentioned, a multitude of small islands and raised fields are scattered across the western and southwestern parts of the lake (map 1.2). Mainly in the littoral zone, these are frequently lined with stands of willows (Salix ssp.) and poplar trees (Populus

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ssp.) planted to bind the soil. Between the islands and the raised fields, both used for vegetable cultivation, the lake is permeated with many hundreds of waterways lined with long stretches of halophyte emergents, including the common reed Phragmites australis, the bulrush Typha angustifolia, and some Typha grosshelmii mixed with the branched bur reed (Sparganium erectum). Between these, a mint (Mentha spec.), sedges (Carex acuta, Scirpus spec.), arrowhead (Saggitaria saggitifolia), and water plantain (Alisma plantagoaquatica) prevail.11 These emergents cover an area of 39.47 hectares according to Kaul et al. (1978) and 50 hectares according to Zutshi and Vass (1982). Hence, they cover about 4 to 5 percent of the total area of the Dal. Many of these long stretches of reed grow along and demarcate the aquatic territories of the market gardeners of the Dal in which they cultivate lotus (Nelumbium nucifera) for its rhizomes and seeds. Another rooted floating leaf-type plant, the water lily (Nymphea alba) and its yellow and mauve hybrid forms cover large areas close to the islands, at the fringes of the waterways, but also parts of the shallow open waters of all the basins. The fringed water lily (Nymphoides peltata) and the frogbit (Hydrocharis dubia) grow mainly in the very shallow waters adjacent to settlements and houseboats, often together with some water chestnut (Trapa natans). Euryale ferox (Nymphaeaceae) were considered extinct on the Dal for years (Kak 2010), but in 2015 they were found to have existed all along, hidden amid the lotus gardens on the lake. They became visible again only when most of the lotus plants were destroyed in the big flood of September 2014. Of greatest importance for the market gardeners’ agronomy, as will be discussed in detail in a later chapter, are the rooted submerged macrophytes. Next to the common pondweed (Potamogeton lucens), those that appear most frequently are the ubiquitous hornwort (Ceratophyllum demersum) and the water milfoil, Myriophyllum spicatum and M. verticilliatum.12 Potamogeton lucens emerges in early April, followed by most of the other rooted, leaf-type water plants such as Potamogeton natans, Elodea spec., hydrilla (Hydrilla verticillata), frogbit (Hydrocharis morsus-ranae), and bladderwort (Utricularia australis). These are the more common water plants among the thirty or so known macrophytes on the Dal (for complete lists and details, see Jeelani and Shah 2006; Qadri and Yousuf 2008; Vass 1980; Zutshi 1975).13 Together with the halophytes, Ceratophyllum, the water lilies and the lotus form the bulk of the rooted plant biomass in the Dal and Nageen Lakes. Due to the high level of nutrients in the water, especially in the vicinity of the inhabited islands and along the neighboring fringes of the canals, masses of filamentous green algae of the genus Oedogonium have developed. They grow as epiphytes on the submerged leaves of the water plants and then, in late spring, emerge and form large layers on the water surface before dying

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off again in late summer and autumn (see fig. 5.1). Around the beginning of May, the first free-floating ferns Salvinia natans and Azolla cristata appear, often together with the duckweed Lemna gibba (Kaul and Bakaya 1976). These species spread out to such an extent that they can make it extremely difficult for shikaras or the lake dwellers’ small boats to steer a trail through the waters. Among the fish fauna, in addition to the indigenous species (e.g., Schizothorax niger, Crossocheilus piplochilus, and Puntius conchonius), two types of domesticated carp (Cyprinus carpio) were introduced into the lake in 1955 (Sehgal 1999; Shafi et al. 2012). These are particularly important for the small fishing community. The common skittering frog (Euphlyctis cyanophlyctis, Ranidae) is the only amphibian living in the lake. Many species of migratory heron14 are found on the Dal in early spring. They stay until the beginning of summer—with the exception of the pond heron that can be sighted throughout the year. Three species of kingfishers, namely the ubiquitous common kingfisher (Alcedo atthis), which is emblematic for the region, the pied kingfisher (Ceryle rudis), and the white-throated kingfisher (Halcyon smyrnensis), can be spotted everywhere, just like the little grebe (Tachybaptus ruficollis) and the common moorhen (Gallinula chloropus). Next to the house sparrow, the most common birds on the lake are the reed warbler (Acrocephalus scirpaceus), whose penetrating calls can be heard all spring and summer, and the yellow wagtail (Motacilla flava). For a comprehensive account on Jammu and Kashmir’s biodiversity, see Ahmedullah (1997).

On Waterways and the Economic History of Kashmir Legend has it that once upon a time, a huge lake filled the whole valley.15 This story was first told in the Nīlamata Purāṇa (composed in the seventh or eighth century) and then also by Kalhana in the foreword of his Rājataraṅgiṇī, which was composed in the middle of the twelfth century. It is reported that this lake was the home of the water-born demon Jalodbhava, who devastated all the neighboring countries. This was told to Muni Kaśyapa, the great sage, by Nīla, the king of the Kashmiri Nāgas (a group of serpent-like semideities; in Kashmiri, nāg means a spring). Muni Kaśyapa promised to free the land from the demon and appealed to the gods who answered his prayers and were willing to help. But the demon hid in the water and could not be defeated. It was only when Viṣṇu’s brother Balabhadra pierced the surrounding mountains with a plowshare so that the land would fall dry that the demon could hide no longer and was slain by Viṣṇu. The gods and the Nāgas then settled on the newly created land that was subsequently adorned with many rivers by different goddesses. In the beginning, however, humans could live

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there for only half of the year, because Kaśyapa, angered by the Nāgas, had cursed them so that they had to share the valley with the Piśācas (a group of flesh-eating demons). These Piśācas now dwelled in the valley during the winter months, and humans had to leave the country for six months and could return only in spring when the Piśācas withdrew. It was only after four Yugas (cosmic cycles) that the Brahman Candradeva was allowed by the Nīlanāgas [Blue Nāgas] to perform a number of rites that freed the country not only from the Piśācas but also from the excessive cold in winter. Henceforth, humans could inhabit the valley of Kashmir throughout the year (see Rajatarangini 1900/1979: 2:388–89).16 After Islamization, the legend was adapted to the new faith and as Torrens (1862: 268, fn.) now reported: “The legend of the country asserts that Solomon visited this valley, and finding it covered, except the hill on which some Mohommadan has dedicated a temple to king Solomon [in fact, the temple is from the fifth century, sanctified to Śiva in the form of Śaṇkarāchārya], with a noxious water which had no outlet, he opened a passage in the mountains (at Baramoula), and gave to Kashmir its beautiful plains.” The myth about the emergence of the land in the valley of Kashmir, also told in the Rājataraṅgiṇī, not only narrates how humans first settled there but also deals with its many rivers—a fact mirroring the extraordinary importance they had and still have for the people. Stein (1899/1977: 100) wrote, The navigable waters of the Vitastā [ Jhelum] have from ancient times to the present day formed the most important highway of Kaśmir. . . . That boats were in old days, just as up to the present time, the ordinary means of travel in the Valley, is shown by the frequent references to river journeys in the Chronicles.17 The value of the river and the numerous canals, lakes, and streams which are also accessible to boats, for the development of internal trade and traffic can hardly be overestimated. Until a couple of years ago there were nowhere in Kaśmir, not even in the flattest parts of the Valley, roads fit for wheeled transport.

Even at the end of the nineteenth century, Stein (1899/1977: 100) observed with reference to the 1891 census that for transport and traffic in the valley, “the number of boatmen engaged in it amounted to nearly 34,000”; and until the end of the twentieth century, almost all internal trade was done via the many lakes, rivers (map 1.3), and canals that crisscross the valley. It was only to places not connected to waterways that goods were carried by either beasts of burden18 or men19 along the small paths running up and down the hills and mountains. As Dar (1999: 49) wrote, “Water transport was the pivot upon which all the internal commerce moved,” and Sharma (1983: 217–18) added, “Vehicular traffic was unknown in the valley and waterways were the chief arteries of internal trade. Even export articles were carried by boats

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up to Khanabal . . . from where these were transported across the Banihal pass. Similarly, the Jhelum being navigable from Khanabal to Baramulla, the goods intended for Afghanistan, Iran, and Turkey were first brought to Baramulla by boat.” Many authors have named and described the different types of boats observed on the rivers, canals, and lakes of Kashmir in the late nineteenth century. They were all of the same flat-bottomed type, usually furnished with a thatched or matted hut-like setup in which the boatpeople lived with their families. However, an unambiguous assignment of the many types of boats and their specific functions is not possible, because many types are mentioned by only one author, whereas others use the same term to describe different boats.20

Map 1.3. The waterways in the valley of Kashmir with Srinagar and the Dal Lake. Source: Nouvelle géographie universelle: la terre et les hommes, 19 vols. (1875–1894). Vol. VIII, détail de L’Inde et l’Indo-Chine: 126–127.

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To avoid confusion, only those boats over which there is a degree of consensus in the literature will be specified here. In my view, the most reliable chronicler is Lawrence (1895: 380–82), who described some of the different boats in great detail. He stated that, excluding private boats, there were 2,417 boats employed in trade and traffic.21 These were mainly dungas, originally with only a reed-thatched roof, but later often also furnished with a solid hut-like construction (image 1.1a. Many of these old dungas are still moored on the Dal and near the embankments of the Jhelum River. Lawrence wrote that goods were transported mainly with the smaller wār and the very big bāhatsh (image 1.1b), the latter totaling 1,066 boats and accounting for about one-half of all boats designed for transport. Whereas the smaller dungas were used to transport persons and/or only small quantities of goods, the very large bahātsh could carry very heavy loads such as wood or bricks or especially paddy, the main and most important produce of the country. Kaw (2001: 93–94 and n273)22 described the transport of paddy, which when milled constitutes the staple food23 of the Kashmiris in the form of rice, as follows: The grains . . . collected through the village headman, were delivered to the official boatman termed tahwildār posted for the purpose in each village. . . . The tahwildār shifted the grains to the city through the large boats called chukwari and each boat lifted around one thousand kharwārs24 of paddy equal to sixty to seventy tonnes. On reaching the city, the grains were stored in the state granaries for onward distribution among the city consumers at the rate prescribed by the state. The distribution of the grains was made on the basis of rationing for which the Afghans [rulers of Kashmir 1753–1819] carried out house to house census and accordingly supplied each family with ration. . . . The river Jhelum was the main source of water transport. The population was settled along its banks which were linked with each other with the help of 10 main bridges out of which 4 were situated in the midst of the proper city of Srinagar.25

But there were also the big state barges, the larinda or parandh (image 1.2) with thirty rowers ( Jacquemont 1834: 68, 82) and the smaller passenger boats reserved for bureaucrats called parinda.26 Then, with the rise of tourism and the emergence of the big tourist houseboats at the end of the twentieth century, the small shikāras27 came into use. They are now used mainly as “water taxies” and also bring tourists from the Dal’s shore to the houseboats and the various scenic locations on the lake. Such boats are also used by tradespeople who bring haberdashery and other everyday goods to the island dwellers and the owners of houseboats. They also supply the tourists on the houseboats with biscuits, soft drinks, cigarettes, and so forth, together with numerous handicraft souvenirs such as wood carvings, painted papier-mâché articles, or special produce of the country such as saffron (for details see chapter 7).

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Image 1.1a, b. Old dungas and the last bahātsh on the Jehlum River. Photos by the author.

The Valley of Kashmir and Dal Lake

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Image 1.2. The Resident Commissioner’s parandh (long boat) on river Jhelum1866. Courtesy Shaukat Wani, Srinagar, private collection.

The next chapter will describe the social and political changes that occurred in Kashmir with the advent of Islam. This dramatic upheaval also led to economic transformations. One of these was the colonizing of the Dal Lake whereby a new population came into being: the Dal Lake market gardeners.

Notes 1. Quoted in Madan (2008: 2). See also Inden (2008: 550) and Temple (1887: 2:59). 2. The mystifying, religious beauty of pristine landscapes also has a long history in Europe; for instance, in Shaftsbury’s hymns or in Alexander Pope’s Essay on Man (1733), the beauty and purity of an unspoiled environment is understood as a sign and symbol of God’s might and glory. In the Romantic period, the religious connota-

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3.

4. 5.

6. 7.

8. 9.

10.

11. 12.

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tion of “natural” environments faded, but its attractiveness remained. In England, for instance, it became a metaphor for “unspoiled beauty,” the “simple life” outside the larger towns and cities, and especially the “beloved homeland” (Conyngham Green 1932; Ousby 1990). Until today, landscapes have always occupied a central position in painting (Howard 2011). For instance, when Pratab Singh ruled Kashmir in 1907, he gave permission to hunt 51 markhors, 219 ibexes, 223 black bears, and 62 brown bears (Younghusband 1911: 119). For an analysis of the general attitude of the English toward the Indian landscapes in colonial times, see Nayar (2004). The Dutch Protestant Francisco Pelsaert wrote in 1626, “All nobles course the place, for it makes the rich poor and the poor cannot fill their stomachs . . . but apparently the King prefers his own comfort or pleasure to the welfare of his people” (quoted in Sufi 1948: 1:261). Foreign travelers who visited India during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries presented a picture of a small group in the ruling class living a life of great ostentation and luxury in sharp contrast to the miserable condition of the masses—the peasants, artisans, and domestic attendants (Chandra 1982: 458). Lawrence wrote in 1897, “Earthquakes, floods, fires, cholera and famines are familiar to every generation”; see also Lawrence (1895: 204–20) for details. “The State [ Jammu & Kashmir] that was thus created [Treaty of Amritsar, 1846] differed from the other internal States of India in that it was totally independent in its internal affairs. No control was exercised by the British Government in the administration, and no resident was appointed. . . . The hostility of the Sikh population and the strained relations with Afghanistan made it necessary for the British Government to cultivate the friendship of Gulab Singh and to treat him as a specially valued ally” (Panikkar 1930: chap. 8, p. 125). For a comprehensive overview of the literature on travels and explorations in Kashmir, see MacDonald (2003). Here a certain confusion must be mentioned, because (as will be described in detail in chapter 9) many publications and maps characterize the whole region as either marshy lands or “floating gardens” (see Jeelani and Shah 2006: 14, fig. 1; Pandit 1992: 47, fig. 1), without giving a detailed differentiation between more or less natural habitats (marshes, swamps) and those parts that have been transformed artificially into the lotus fields and floating gardens used by horticulturalists. Al-Biruni already reported, “Kashmir has no varshakalâla [tropical rains], but continual snowfall over the period of two and a half months. Beginning with Mâgha [ January–February] and shortly after the middle of Caitra [March–April], continual rain sets in for a few days, melting the snow and cleansing the earth.” There are hardly any exceptions to this rule; however, a certain amount of extraordinary meteorological occurrences is peculiar to every province of India (Sachau 1964: xviii, 211–12). A Persian proverb regarding the climate of the valley quoted by Sharma (1983: 16n45) says, “Garmāsh nah garm ast, sarmāsh nah sard ast” (There is heat but it is not hot, there is cold but it is not cold). For a broader list, see also Qadri and Yousuf (2008: 1455). For detailed information on the milfoil species in Kashmir, especially in the Dal, see Arshid and Wani (2011).

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13. Whereas the general Kashmiri term for all submerged rooted plants is hil, the indi-

14.

15.

16.

17. 18. 19.

20. 21.

22. 23.

24.

25. 26. 27.

vidual species are differentiated into, for instance, zāg hil for Potamogeton crispus and tsāt hil for P. lucen. Hydrilla verticillata is called gād hil. The most common species, the hornwort Ceratophyllum demersum, is called gῑun hil, and Myriophyllum demersum is called chās hil. These are the little and the great egret (Egretta garzetta and E. alba), the gray heron (Ardea cinerea), the night heron (Nycticorax nycticorax), and the pond heron (Areola ralloides), generically all called brag. Geological analyses show that the so-called Pleistocene Karewa formation together with Permian and Triassic formations surround the Vale and the lakes (Bose 1961; Fuchs 1975; Mir 1986: 60–70; Raza et al. 1978). For a detailed account, see Inden (2008: 542–44) and Madan (2008: 3–4). A comparable narrative is reported by the Chinese pilgrim Yuan Chwang, who traveled through Kashmir in a.d. 629–645 and related the drying up of the valley to the magic of the Buddhist Madhyāntika who brought Buddhism to the valley (Watters 1973: 264–65). For similar and other versions, see Ahmad and Bano (1984: 124–26). Stein (1899/1977: 114–16) reports that such legends also exist for Wular Lake. See, Rājataraṅgiṇī, vol. 84: vii, 347, 714, 1628. The usual measure for weight was thus the kharwār (an ass load) that was then converted into dāms, also known as paisa (Habib 1999: 432–33, 460n41). In his Jesting Pilate: The Diary of a Journey, Aldous Huxley (1957: 20–21) observed, “It is cheaper in this country to have a waggon pulled by half a dozen men than by a pair of oxen or horses. All day, on the road below our house, the heavy-laden carts go creaking slowly along behind their team of human draft animals.” See, for instance Bamzai (1987: 66–57), Drew (1875/1976: 181), Mam (1985), Neve (n.d.: 5), Sanyal (1979: 21–30), and Temple (1887: 1:295). Earlier authors such as Abū-l Fazl reported even as many as 3,000; and in Jahangir’s Tuzūk-ī Jahāngīrī (1968), it is said that the number of boatmen was fixed at 7,400 (quoted in Kaw 2001: 93n273). Quoting G. T. Vigne (1842: 1:308) and Abū-l Fazl’s Ᾱ‘īn-i Akbarī (1969: 2:142). For a description of agricultural produce, food, and drink in medieval Kashmir, see Mohan (1981: 247–56); for the nineteenth century, see Lawrence (1895: 71–74, 253–55). One kharwār (in short: khar) was equal to one ass load, which was equivalent to about 780 kilograms. As a land measure, a kharwār is the amount of seed required in a certain area to produce one kharwār of rice. This is equivalent to about four British or American acres (Lawrence 1909: 25). For a comprehensive description of the economic and especially the revenue system, see Habib (1982: 235–60), Hangloo (1995: 45–79), and Kaw (2001: 68–75, 167). For images of the different types of boats in Kashmir, see Dattatreya (1955). They earned their name in colonial times when the British sportsmen used them for their hunting (Hindi/Urdu: shikār karna = hunting) and fishing expeditions.

2  Kashmir’s Early History and the Conversion to Islam Emergence and Structure of Hindu Society in Kashmir Before the advent of Islam, most of the population in the valley was either Buddhist1 or Hindu. This chapter provides some information on the origins and early history of the Kashmiri Brahmans as well as some of the lower Hindu castes in order to make it easier to understand how the social organization of today’s Muslim majority developed in Kashmir after Islamization. For a long time, the origin of the Kashmiri Brahmans, who later came to be collectively called “Paṇḍits,” was shrouded in mystery. Even in 1988, Sender (p. 5) remarked, “No historical work has dealt in satisfactory fashion with the origins of the Pandits.” Shaped by the Zeitgeist of Western ethnologists in the nineteenth century, they were linked to the very early “High Arians” as a result of their fair complexion and other physical markers (Campbell 1866: 57), and it was supposed that they had migrated to Kashmir from Central Asia (Kaul 1924: 18). There was also speculation that they stem from Greeks and Persians, dating back to the time of Alexander the Great, or are even of Jewish origin based on the “theory of the lost tribe of Israel” (e.g., Sufi 1948–49: 1: 16). Other authors have drawn on the account in the Rājataraṅgiṇī and postulated more persuasively that the Kashmiri Hindus are descended from Kanyakubja Brahmans.2 The Rājataraṅgiṇī recounts that Jalauka, allegedly the son of Aśoka, had conquered Kanyakubja

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(i.e., Kannauj) in the region of Āryāvarta3 and had settled people of all four castes in his country (Colebrooke 1803: 226). Gandhāra is also mentioned as a possible origin based on an entry in Kalhaṇa’s Rājataraṅgiṇῑ (KRT, 1:307). Influenced by Western hypotheses, some Kashmiri historians referred to their community as the “first of the Aryans, the most ancient and purest blood” (e.g., Kaul 1924, Kaul 1883: 3). Others discussed their origin in legendary terms, supposing that the Kashmiri Paṇḍits are descendants of Kaśyapa, the first of the seven Ṛṣis. This speculation was based on a narrative in the Nīlamata Purāṇa, the most important religious text of the Kashmiri Paṇḍits, in which it is told that the snake deity Nῑla took Kaśyapa Ṛṣi to his home, worshipped him, fed him, and taught him the practices to be followed when living in Kashmir. This reflects a synthesis of the regional pre-Vedic traditions of the snake cult and Brahmanic gods. These portray Kashmir as a land of Brahmanic orthodoxy whose inhabitants performed sacrifices and were virtuous ascetics well versed in the Vedas. More light on the early history of the Kashmiri Brahmans came only recently in Michael Witzel’s (1994, 2008) meticulous and highly comprehensive studies based mainly on classical sources. It can now be stated that they mainly branched off from the Sārasvata division of the North Indian Brahmans who migrated to Kashmir from the Panjab and from Rajasthan around the beginning of the fifth century.4 However, migration from Konkan is also highly probable (Witzel 2008: 40, 59). Later, in the times of King Mihirakula and King Gopāditya from the middle to the end of the sixth century, Brahmans from other regions came to the valley in waves and merged with the resident Sārasvatas (Witzel 2008: 59; see, also Sanderson 2009: 100). Possibly in the Middle Ages, the Hindu Brahmans of Kashmir then formed a homogeneous group who called themselves and were called “Paṇḍits.” Nonetheless, it has to be assumed that in early times, alongside the Brahmans, the broader society in Kashmir also comprised numerous different tribes, castes, and classes.5 The Nīlamata Purāṇa of the seventh to eighth century a.d. names thirteen tribes, reporting that it is especially the Nāgas, worshippers of serpent deities, who are thought to be the original inhabitants of prehistoric Kashmir (1968/1973: 1:46–75). It goes on to report that next to the “Brāhmaṇas, there are also the Kṣatriyas, who are skilled in the use of all sorts of weapons and the Vaiśyas, described as being engaged in agriculture, cattle-rearing and trade. There are also the Śūdras, probably workers, servants of the higher varṇa, weavers, jewelers, black-smiths, sculptors, potters, leather tanners etc.” (1968/1973: 1:77–87; see also Ahmad 1979: 6). Some low castes or classes were also identified by Ray (1970: 124–29; for details see, Mohan 1981: 222–24) in Kalhaṇa’s Rājataraṅgiṇī, which was composed about three hundred years later. These are the Niṣā-

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das, the Kirātas, the Kaivartas, the Ḍombas, the Śvapākas (literally the “dog cookers”), and the Caṇḍālas, possibly an aboriginal tribe. Stein referred to the Rājataraṅgiṇī (1899/1977: 124) when he wrote, The modern Ḍūmbs, the descendants of the old Ḍombas, are still the lowcaste watchmen and village-menials as which they figure in Kalhaṇa’s narrative. They, like the still more despised Vātals, or scavengers, cannot intermarry with the other Kaśmīrīs.

In a footnote on the Ḍombas in the Rājataraṅgiṇī, he added, “These passages show that the Ḍombas also earned their bread as hunters, fishermen, buffoons, quacks, etc., and their daughters as singers and dancers.” A different tribe was the Ḍāmaras, who possibly were recruited partly from the Lavanya tribe. They played an important role in Kashmir’s history (mainly in the first phase of the Lohara dynasty, a.d. 1003–1320). They are said to have been a fierce tribe from the northern mountains who became powerful territorial lords and landowners in Kashmir (for a comprehensive account and analysis, see Mohan 1981: 179–210, 330–37). Ray (1970: 97–114) considered that all these tribes, castes, and classes had been living in Kashmir from a very early period onward, and he concluded that “the organization of the Hindu social system, typical for the Gupta period in northern India, was well established in Kashmir by the late fifth century” (see also Ahmad 1979: 6; Witzel 2008: 56, 58), when Pravarasena II was king and Pravarapura, the oldest part of present-day Srinagar, was founded (Goetz 1969: 91). Bābur’s cousin Mῑrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt (1499/50–1551), who was in the service of the Mughal sultan Said Khan and entered Kashmir in 1531, wrote in his Tarikh-i-Rashidi (completed in 1543), “It is said that the inhabitants of Kashmir [before the advent of Islam] all used to be Hindus of the Brahman sect” (Mῑrzā Ḥaidar 1996: 261). However, it is necessary to concur with Hangloo (2008: 105–6) that: the majority of the people who converted to Islam in medieval Kashmir were non-Brahmans, comprising of peasants, share-croppers, craftsmen, pastoralists, village menials and people of other professions such as weavers, blacksmiths, washer men, barbers, woodcutters, saw holders, carpenters, etc. and belonging to various religious denominations like Buddhism, Shaivism, Vaishnavism, Shakta, Tantra and various mother goddess cults.

It was in the time of Zayn al-’Ābidῑn’s rule (1418–70), after most people in Kashmir had converted to Islam, that a differentiation of the formerly homogeneous Paṇḍit society emerged. Supported by the king, most of the Paṇḍits’ sons now began to study Persian, the language of the court.6 They were employed by the government as translators or clerks, and only few sons, it is said, devoted themselves to the study of Sanskrit and the scriptures

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(Madan 1989: 19; Witzel 2008: 38).7 Due to this economic differentiation, the Paṇḍits split into different factions: • The priest class, Bāch Bhaṭṭa, who studied vāc (“the language,” i.e., Sanskrit). They were then called Guru or Gor, dedicating their lives to the study of the scriptures and performing the religious rites for their Brahman brothers. • The Jotish, astrologers, who also studied the Śāstras, expounded them to the Hindus and made prophecies about coming events, but did not take up priestly duties. • The Kārkun, who formed the absolute majority of the population. Those proficient in Persian became writers employed mainly by the state, but others practiced secular occupations, with many becoming farmers (Madan 1987: 23; Madan 1995: 182; Sharma 1983: 103–4; Witzel 2008: 38). • The Guru/Gor, who were completely dependent on the gifts of the yajmān (mainly the rich landowners) for whom they performed rituals.8 They were strictly endogamous,9 unlike the Jotish and the Kārkuns who intermarried.

The Meaning and Function of Gotra and Kram However, over time, “Paṇḍit” became the generic term for all Hindus in Kashmir independent of their occupation. Witzel (2008: 37) has asserted that “the Kashmiri Paṇḍits are unique among all their Brahman confrères in the rest of South Asia in that they form one single group, the Kāśmīra Brāhmaṇas, without any real subdivisions.” But as Hindus, they are further differentiated into different gotras, usually defined as patrilineal exogamous clans. These are important in relation to the performance of religious rituals; and, moreover, they acquire a social importance when a Paṇḍit marries because of the prescribed gotra exogamy. Madan (1962: 73) pointed out that, in fact, the gotra is thought of as a name; and like all names its purpose is to identify an individual for certain specified purposes. He explained, “Among the Brahmans agnates always have the same gotra-name but all sagotra [of the same gotra] are not recognized to be kin,” and he concluded that “not only are the gotra not based on kinship, they do not seem to be based upon descent either” (Madan 1962: 73). In summary, therefore, he objected to the above-stated understanding of the gotra as “clans,” proclaiming that the Brahmanic gotra . . . is not based upon kinship or descent, and is not a grouping in its own right. For men it is at best a category of people, sharing a common name, who may be agnatically related and may not, therefore, inter-

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marry. The position of women is different from that of men in so far as they belong to their father’s gotra for the purpose of marriage and to their husband’s gotra for ritual purposes. The Brahmanic gotra is not, therefore, a clan or any other kind of grouping. The foregoing statement applies to the Brahmans of Kashmir and, I trust, Brahmans elsewhere. (Madan 1962: 75)

Apart from the Paṇḍit gotra names,10 which are usually not known by outsiders, all families (sometimes even only an individual) also possess a kram name that has a purely social appellation. It is irrelevant in the religious context, unless it is itself derived from the gotra name (Madan 1962: 68). Mohan (1981: 195) explained, The krām names are little more than nicknames which were given to specific characteristics, and though they are now [in the Middle Ages] connected with the caste system, this was not the case in earlier times. When Kalhaṇa speaks of a householder becoming rich and attaining the position of a Ḍāmara,11 we believe him to mean that his appellation was used for these people as a nickname to show their status, and not that it implied a change of caste.

Kram names function as an individual’s last name and signify an “uninterrupted or regular progress, order, succession or hereditary descent” (Monier-Williams 1899/1974).12 Because a village has many families and households of the same gotra, these kram names also differentiate between them, and they are often described as nicknames (Grierson and Shastri 1918; Kaul, A. 1924). Kram names are often linked to a householder’s occupation—for example, “Khār,” indicating that the ancestors were smiths. They can also relate to specific events or attributes of the family or household. This can be a fruit tree such as Ḍūn (walnut), an animal such as Kākā (crow), Kokuru (fowl), Gagur (rat), or Dānd (bullock), as well as a vegetable, spice, or utensil (Kaw 2004: 310–12; for a list, see Kachru 1995: 321). These kram names can relate to a tribal ancestry, as in the Lons and the Ḍars, who derive their names from the once-tribal Lavanyas and Ḍāmaras, respectively (Mohan 1981: 337). Such monikers can also change over time, as narrated in the well-known tale of a Paṇḍit who was named after a mulberry tree in his yard: A man named Wásdev had a mulberry tree growing in his courtyard and, therefore he was called Wásdev Tul (Mr. Mulberry). He, in order to get rid of this nick-name, cut down the tree. But a mund (trunk) remained and people began to call him Wásdev Mund. He then removed the trunk of the tree but by its removal a khud (depression) was caused and henceforth people called him Wásdev Khud. He then filled up the depression and the ground became teng (a little elevated) and he began to be called Wásdev Teng. Thus exasperated, he left to do any other attempt to remove the cause of his nick-

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name and it continued to be Teng which is now attached to the names of his descendants.13

Because it is up to the individual male householder whether he wants to use his ancestral gotra name or an acquired kram name as his surname, there have sometimes been brothers who use distinct last names: one might use Kaul (Koul) his gotra-marking ancestral name, and the other Tūl, deriving from the Persian word tūt for mulberry, as an acquired name (Kachru 1995: 320–21). As I shall report later, these kram names were often retained by the Kashmiris after Islamization and now figure as their family names.14

Kashmir’s Conversion to Islam No theme is more controversial than the way Kashmir converted to Islam. Controversies concern not only the period of systematic conversion, which began in the fourteenth century under the Šāh Mīr dynasty ( JRT: 308) but also in earlier centuries, during which, as many historians suppose, Islamization had already started as a slow and peaceful process. Surely, Kashmir was always what Cohen (1967, quoted in Sender 1988: 4) has called a “shatter zone,” defined as a “traditional region through which large numbers of people passed, either in military or peaceful invasions.” By all indications there are, in fact, good arguments to assume that merchants and mercenaries were already coming to Kashmir in the eighth century and that some of these might well have been Muslims. However, to deduce, as many historians have done,15 that “the process of Islamization started as early as the eighth century” (Ahangar 1986: 18), and that it began slowly, must be questioned. For instance, though he does not give any precise reference, Singh (2000: 1: 3) is obviously referring to the Šāhnāma epos when he writes, During the Caliphate of Hisham (724–753) the Arab . . . conquest of Sindh profoundly affected Kashmir . . . it brought for the first time the people of Kashmir and the followers of Islam in contact with each other. According to Chahnama, after Raja Dahir of Sindh was defeated by the Arabs, his son Jai Singh or Jaisya, took refuge in Kashmir. . . . Jai Singh was accompanied by a Syrian named Hanim or Hamin. Hamin is said to have been [the] first Muslim who set his foot on the soil of Kashmir. When Jaisya died, Hanim succeeded him to his dependency and made the most of his opportunity to propagate his religion among his acquaintances and friends.

To the best of my knowledge, there are no serious sources indicating that Muslim traders and mercenaries, who supposedly neither had experienced formal Islamic training empowering them to preach the creed nor were able

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to speak a local language, had taken any interest in proselytizing among the inhabitants of Kashmir as far back as the eighth century. In this context, another argument for early Islamic influence in the region has been proposed: it revolves around the assignment of the terms mleccha and turuṣka in Kalhaṇa’s Rājataraṅgiṇῑ (KRT in the following). These mlecchas and turuṣkas, who came into contact with the Hindu and Buddhist population of the valley, were often regarded as Muslims (e.g., Khan 1986; Wani 2004: 47). Hangloo (2008: 119), for instance, stated that “the terms mleccha and turushka denoted Muslims, the latter having established themselves in the lower hill regions neighboring Kashmir, probably Rajouri and Poonch” (KRT: 1:364). Such a generalizing presumption, however, must be called into question. The entry in KRT (1:364) quoted by Hangloo (2008: 119) refers to King Harṣa’s (a.d. 1089–1101) campaign against the Lavanyas, probably a tribal section of the ḍāmaras (Wink 1996: 238). However, there is no indication in Kalhaṇa’s work that these mlecchas and turuṣkas were Muslims. Further, a careful reading of the KRT reveals that the term mleccha was already being used under the rule of Aśoka and Jalauka in roughly a.d.250 (KRT: 1:107, 115, 116) and also in the period when Kaniṣka ruled (approximately first century a.d.). In these early periods, long before the advent of Islam, the term mleccha stood only for foreign speakers of non-Indian languages from countries where the fourfold varṇa system (cāturvarṇa) did not operate. In KRT (4:397), for instance, it is said that “the ruler has sold men to the mlecchas,” a passage that with utmost probability alludes to the slave trade, which was common in those days and went in either direction between Central Asia and India (Walter Slaje, pers. comm.). Such unwarranted assumptions also concern the generalized rendering of the ethnonym turuṣkas into “Muslims.” In KRT (4:179), these turuṣkas were thought to have lived during the early eighth century under the rule of Lalitaditya Muktāpῑḍa (ca. 724–61), and again there are no indications that these turuṣkas were Muslims. As Peter Andrews kindly advised me, the ethnonym turuṣka is usually transliterated as Türgesh or Türgish,16 a tribe within the On Oq confederation at the heart of the West Turkish Qaghanate. It is normally held that the Oghuz, not the Türgesh, were the first of the West Turks to become Muslims. It was probably under the pressure of the Qarakhanids (a.d. 932–1165), who had adopted Islam relatively early, that the Oghuz also converted. Later, these Oghuz became known as Turkmen, possibly denoting that they had become Muslims. It can thus be assumed that the Türgesh (turuṣkas), who converted only after Oghuz had taken on the new creed, had not converted before the very late tenth or the early eleventh century. Also later, when King Ananta (1028–63) of the Lohara dynasty purportedly campaigned alongside seven mleccha princes against the invading Ḍāra-

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das17 under King Acalamaṅgala, it is questionable to assume that the latter were Muslim chiefs who, as Aurel Stein had surmised, originated from Chilas and Astor in the Gilgit region (cited in Mohan 1981: 1–5). Thus, one can agree with Krishna Mohan (1981: 270) and his meticulous description and analysis of the era of the Lohara dynasty in Kashmir (a.d. 1003–1171) when he concludes that “no conversions to Islam are recorded by our sources as having taken place at this stage of the history of Kashmir.” That the term mleccha was used indiscriminately for all foreigners who did not speak the local language, and turuṣka especially for Turks from West or Central Asia, becomes clear from a passage in the KRT (8:2843), which states, “the people feared that the territory invaded by the turuṣkas had fallen [altogether] into their power, and thought that the whole county was overrun by the mlecchas.”18 With regard to the use of the two terms mleccha and turuṣka in the KRT before the late eleventh century a.d., it can be concluded that not all mlecchas mentioned in the KRT were turuṣkas, not all turuṣkas mentioned were Muslims, but all turuṣkas could have been called mlecchas as well.19 When, however, Kalhaṇa used these terms in the context of specific incidents—for instance, when referring to the Muslim Mahmud of Ghazni who tried to invade Kashmir with his troops in 1015 and 1021, and possibly also when giving his account of the mercenaries King Harṣa (1098–1111) had employed to fight against the Ḍāmaras20—it is legitimate to equate them with “Muslims,” as in many cases when Jonarāja is reporting on later events in Kashmir’s history in his Rājataraṅgiṇῑ. In fact, for this late period, it can be assumed that the influx of Muslims into Kashmir grew; but again, this aspect alone cannot be used to infer that a more systematic conversion had taken place in the valley. Even as late as the thirteenth century, when, as Hangloo (2008: 120) speculated (without referring to sources), both Muslim migrants and, now, for the first time, also converts had settled permanently in Kashmir, “no historical sources indicate that a more systematic conversion had taken place.”

Systematic Conversion Accounts of and opinions on the more systematic conversion21 that started to take place in the fourteenth century in Kashmir differ greatly. Often, a certain bias is obvious: Muslim scholars often try to show, on the basis of mainly Persian chronicles, that conversion was largely peaceful and without force (e.g., Bamzai 1994; Hangloo 2008; M. I. Khan 2008; Wani 2004: 105–34), whereas Hindu/Paṇḍit scholars tend to stress more forceful and brutal conversions on the basis of other reports or also on different readings

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of the same Persian chronicles (e.g., Koul 1924; Pandita 2004; Toshkhani 2004).22 Among Muslim scholars, there is also disagreement on whose influence among the different Sayyids coming from Iran and Central Asia was most influential in proselytizing the Kashmiris, as Ishaq Khan (1985: 86–87) explained: While Persian chroniclers ascribe the success of Islam to Sayyid ‘Ali Hamadani’s (d. a.d. 1385) proselytizing activities, others lay stress on the “fanatical zeal” of his son, Mir Sayyid Muhammad Hamadani and his disciples, who are said to have forcibly converted Hindus to Islam. Another view is that it was Sultan Sikandar (a.d. 1389–1413) who, by his iconoclastic activities, put so much pressure on the Hindus that they were forced to migrate, leaving behind them only eleven families in Kashmir to preserve their ancient faith [see also Hangloo 2008: 104–5].

Ishaq Khan (1986) also argued convincingly that the local Ṛṣis, mainly those of Nūr ud-Dῑn23 and Lallā Ded (or Lal Ded), had a much more significant impact and influence on the spread of Islam than Sufis such as Mῑr Sayyid ‘Ali Hamadānῑ, who “contrary to what many of his biographers may argue, spent very little time in that region” (Khan 1994a, 1994b; see also Elias 2000: 396, 412). He substantiated his argument by also pointing out that these Sufis who came from Central Asia and Persia did not speak Kashmiri.24 In fact, it was only “the Śivaite, Lallā who, at the start of the Mussulman occupation, had for the first time used the popular language of her country in mystic hymns” (Naudou 1980: 260). Thus it is reasonable to conclude that evidence for a direct proselytizing influence of these Sufis on the masses is scant, as Ahmad (1979: 12) has pointed out; and that it is “more probable that the immediate result of his [‘Āli Hamadāni’s] sojourns in Kashmir was not the ‘conversion’ of non-Muslims, but rather the ‘Islamization’ of the ruling dynasty and the ‘nominally Muslim’ elements of the ruling élite.” Moreover, Rafiqi (1977: 209) has also noted that “the tradition of mixing with the rulers and taking part in political affairs was established by the early Suhrawardi and Kubravi saints. They believed that by associating themselves with royal courts, they could change the outlook of rulers.” It therefore seems that a top-down strategy for conversion was the way often chosen by many Sufis. It was then supported by those Muslim Ṛṣis (e.g., Šayḫ Nūr ud-Dῑn Ṛṣi) who preached the creed to the common people in their language. Independent from any differential weighting of the influence of the two proselytizing agencies, the importance of the migrating Sayyids cannot be denied. The first among the many prominent Sayyids who came to Kashmir was Sayyid ‘Abd ar-Rahmān Sharaf ud-Dῑn Suhravardῑ from the Suhravardiyya order, who was later popularly known as Sayyid Bulbul Shah (died

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1326). Coming from Turkistan, he entered Kashmir during the reign of Suhadeva (1301–20). With him, it is said, conversion to Islam began.25 It was the Ladakhi prince Rin-chen (Lha-chen rgyal-bu) who first embraced Islam ( JRT: 147–220). He converted for personal and political reasons, because the Śaiva-Gurus, especially the priest Devasvāmin, had refused to grant sovereignty to a Buddhist. Rin-chen took on the name Ṣadr al-Dῑn but reigned for only three years (1320–23). He had no impact on the religion of the country. The first Muslim dynasty came about only when Šams ad-Dīn, known as Šāh Mīr (1339–42), enforced a marriage with the last Hindu ruler Koṭā Devī and usurped the throne. With him, a consistent line of Muslim rulers in Kashmir began. Most authors, however, are of the opinion that the more systematic mass conversion began only in 1372, when Mir Sayyid ‘Āli Hamadānῑ, a Sufi of the Kubraviyya order26 known in Kashmir also as Amīr-i-Kabīr (1314–85), came to the valley. His order had a certain leaning toward Shiism (Boyle 1968) and Hamadānῑ had designated himself, some say, as a “second ‘Ali.”27 This sometimes led to the assumption that he was a Shia.28 However, the majority of his followers were certainly Sunnis. It is reported that he initially stayed for only four months in Kashmir before proceeding on a pilgrimage to Mecca. But when he returned in 1379, he stayed for two and a half years before leaving Kashmir again for Turkistan. He entered Kashmir for the third and last time in 1383, bringing with him, according to the legend, seven hundred of his followers. It is said that he made large-scale conversions to Islam in the following years,29 so that the Kubraviyya became the most important order in the valley during the second half of the fourteenth century. Jonarāja, an advisor in the time of Zayn al-’Ābidῑn (1418–70), reported in his Rājataraṅgiṇī that Sultan Sikandar (1389–1413) (called the but-shikan [idol breaker]), under the influence of ‘Āli Hamadānῑ’s son Sayyid Mohammad and his minister Sayf ad-Dῑn (Sūha Bhaṭṭa), severely persecuted the Hindus and forcibly converted them to Islam, but that he also enforced the Sharia among the Muslim population. Jonarāja’s accounts, which were reported again in the Bahāristān-i-Shāhῑ written in about 1620 (Pandit 1991: 93), should, however, be read with caution, because he, as an orthodox Hindu and possibly one of the beneficiaries of an agrahāra (tax-free landholding), might have exaggerated the anti-Hindu policies of Sikandar and Sayf-ad-Dῑn, as Hangloo (2008a: 103–4) has remarked. According to Paṇḍit tradition, most Hindus did flee the country, and only eleven families remained in Kashmir. After the death of Sultan Sikandar, his son and successor Zayn al-Ābidῑn (1418–70) practiced a policy of religious tolerance not only toward all Sufis and Ṛṣis,30 who were allowed to continue with their preaching and a peaceful conversion of Hindus to Islam, but also toward the Hindus

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who had fled the country, who were allowed to return. As reported in the Bahāristān-i Shāhῑ (1991: 66; see also 74), Whereas the Sultan showed considerable favor and regard for the Muslim nobles and their learned men, he also undertook the re-construction of the monuments of the infidels and the communities of the polytheists. He popularized the practice of the infidels and the heretics and the customs of idol-worshippers. . . . All those temples and idol-houses of the infidels, which have been destroyed totally in the reign of Sulṭān Sikandar may God bless his soul, were re-built and rehabilitated by him. Most of the unbelievers and polytheists, who had fled to the lands of Jammu and Kishtwār because of the overwhelming strength of Islam, were induced by him to return to Kashmir.

The descendants of these Brāhmaṇs who had survived the persecution during Sikandar’s reign are known as malamasi; and those who had fled the country but were then allowed to return are known as banamasi (Madan 1989: 17). In all these centuries, it was not just Hindus who suffered. The Shia minority was persecuted repeatedly by Sunni fanatics, as will be described in the following chapter. Although historians have seldom described and analyzed these persecutions in detail, they are of special interest here, because an educated guess allows us to link these persecutions to the populating of the swamps and islands of the Dal Lake by Shiites.

The Fate of the Shia Minority between 1500 and 1800 From the very beginning of a more systematic conversion to Islam, a split slowly gained ground between the Sunni and the Shia faiths. At times, the Shia population was exposed repeatedly to severe persecutions alongside the Hindus. In the following, the fate of the Shia population of the valley will be described in more detail, because this might explain why the absolute majority of market gardeners on the Dal are Shiites. The problems between the two Islamic creeds in Kashmir began in 1496 with the arrival in Kashmir of Mir Shams ud-Din Iraki,31 a follower of Sayyid Muhammad Nūrbakhsh (1393–1464), the founder of the Nūrbakhshiyya Sufi order.32 He had a strong leaning toward the Shia faith (Hasan 1959: 283–88; Mattoo 1985: 101) and clandestinely spread Nūrbakhshi beliefs among the population (Elias 2000: 402). In the beginning, Mir Shams ud-Din had converted, according to tradition, twenty-four thousand Brahmin families (Kak 1998: 65; Sender 1988: 25). As Parmu (1969: 394) pointed out, “Culturally, Shams-ud-din Iraqi (1505–1526) a noted fanatic, was able to establish the Shia-Nurbakhshi creed by pressure; at the same time, he extirpated all remnants of active Hinduism.”

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When he then also converted some nobles of the then-ruling Chak dynasty (1555–86)33 to his doctrine, this gave political force to Twelver Shiism (Mattoo 1988: 149; Sharma 1983: 87). When different Shia sects started to branch from the Kubrawiyya (which was originally propagated by Āli Hamdānῑ), the Nūrbakhshiyya sect gained ground in Kashmir (Ishaq Khan 1978: 11). Hence, it can be supposed that already in the late sixteenth century, both creeds of Islam were to be found in Kashmir34 with growing animosities between the two groups. As Parmu (1969: 394) declared, “He (Shams ud-Din) brought about transformation of far-reaching consequences in the Muslim society when he injected the Shias with the virus of hate and animosity against the Sunnis. For three centuries (1519–1819) continually they fought against each other with devastating results.” When Mīrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt, Babur’s cousin, entered Kashmir for the first time in 1532 as a commander under Sultan Sayyid Khān, who came from Tibet, this led to a battle with the Kashmiris. In this fight, the army of the Kashmiri nobles, who were Shiites under the leadership of Malik Kājī Chak, finally defeated the Sunni “Turks.” In the following years, the domain was divided into three parts: one was given to Mīrzā Ḥaidar, who held absolute power in Kashmir; a second to Abdāl Māgray; and a third to Malik Regī Chak (Bahāristān-i-Shāhī 1991: 127 and n74, 158). Then, in 1540, during the time of Mughal rule, Mīrzā Ḥaidar, who was in Humayuns’s service and an orthodox Sunni, entered Kashmir. He first extended remarkable courtesy to Kashmiri nobles (Bahāristān-i-Shāhī 1991: 135) and was quite liberal toward the other religions, especially toward the Nūrbakhshiyyas. He established good governance and tried to promote trade, agriculture, the arts, and industry (Hasan 1959: 142–43). However, when Regi Chak,35 until then a follower of the Nūrbakhshiyya sect, became a Twelver Shiite36 and started a revolt against him, his attitude changed. In the following years, in order to create a uniform religion in the country, he persecuted all other creeds, mainly the Sufis, the Shiites, and the Nūrbakhshiyyas,37 about whom Mῑrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt remarked in 1543, in his Ta’riḫ-i Rašῑdῑ (1996: 262–63): In the time of Sultan Nadir’s father Fath Shah,38 a man named Shams came from Talish in Iraq, calling himself a Nurbakhshi. He brought with him a corrupt sect he called Nurbakhshi, but he evidenced all sort of heathenism and heresy and spread a book of jurisprudence called Fiqh-i-ahwat among those wretched people. His beliefs correspond to nothing known among the various sects of the Sunnis, Rafizis, and Shiites.39 These people consider it necessary to anathematize the Companions and Ayisha, which is the hallmark of the Rafizis, yet contrary to the beliefs of the Shiites they consider Sayyid Muhammad Nurbakhshi as the lord of the age and the promised messiah.

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And further on, regarding the Sufis: At the present in Kashmir the Sufis, who are nothing but a bunch of heretics, have come under the sway of innumerable “imams” who know nothing of what is licid and illicit, and who think that piety and purity consist of nothing more than staying awake at night and eating little. Moreover, they eat anything they receive and take without compunction for its legality since they all take greedily and lustfully from endowments that are in accordance with the law. They do nothing but interpret dreams and produce “miracles” and the like. They tell of the past and future events they learn “from the blue.” . . . They belittle and humiliate knowledge and the people of learning. . . . Such heretics have not been seen elsewhere. May God preserve the people of Islam from such catastrophes and calamities, and may His guide all onto the path of the Law, through Mohammad and his glorious family and companions. Praise God for such success. (p. 263; see also Kak 1998: 71)

In the Ta’riḫ-i Rašῑdῑ (1996: 263–64), Mῑrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt then reported, At present [ca. 1543] no one can pronounce such nonsense publicly. Now they all denounce [this sect] absolutely and show themselves to be good Sunnis. My severity has made them aware that if they act openly they will be treated with nothing but the death penalty. It is hoped that this wretchedness will leave their minds, with God’s help and through my own efforts [see also Singh 2000, 1:26].

Also Hasan (1959: 143–44) wrote, referring to the Bahāristān-i-Shāhī, In his zeal to preserve the Islamic orthodoxy he banned Shī’ism and the Shāfi’ite school. Moreover, he secured a decree from the ‘Ulemā of Hindustān that the Nūrbakhshīyas were heretics, and that it was perfectly lawful to destroy them if they persisted in their beliefs and refused to accept the teachings of Abū Ḥanīfa. Accordingly he began to persecute them, and put to death many of their leaders. He also placed a ban on other Ṣūfī orders on the ground that Ṣūfīs led immoral lives, ate and drank forbidden things, and spent their time interpreting dreams, displaying miracles, and prostrating themselves before one another. In this way Mīrzā Ḥaidar compelled every Muslim to conform to the Sunni faith.

In this first period of cruel persecutions,40 which is still present today in the historic memory of many of the Shiites, thousands fled and tried to escape conversion or death.41 It was only after the Kashmiri nobles had successfully revolted against Mῑrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt that a better time began for them. After the death of Mīrzā Ḥaidar in 1551 when the influence of the Chaks, who had supported the Shiite community, grew again, new conflicts flared up between the two creeds. However, now it was the turn of the Sunnis to be persecuted, until, in the times of a short interregnum, Ali-Shah (1570–78) followed a policy of tolerance toward them. Then, after his reign, when Yu-

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suf Shah and then his son Sultan Yaqub came to power, the Shiites were again branded as heretics and persecuted. Even later, after the Mughals had conquered Kashmir in 1586, there were repeated conflicts and clashes between the two communities (Rafiqi 1977: 221–22).42 In the period of Afghan/Pathan rule (1753–1819), the Shiites had to face the next great wave of terror. This was as awful as the persecution through Mīrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt in the middle of the sixteenth century. Together with the Hindus, the Shiites were again harassed brutally, and many who could not escape lost their lives: The victims of these fiends were the Pandits, the Shias and the Bombas43 of the Jhelum valley. First in the rank of oppressors comes Asad Khan. . . . It was his practice to tie up the Pandits, two and two, in grass sacks and sink them in the Dal lake. . . . Mir Hazar was another fiend who used leather bags instead of grass sacks for the drowning of Brahmans. He drowned Shias and Brahmans indiscriminately. (Lawrence 1895: 197–98)

Serious riots also erupted later, during the period of Pathan rule. For instance, when Buland Khan Bamzai (1763–65) was governor, Zadibal (a Shiite locality in Srinagar) was set on fire, the Shiites were looted, and many of them were mutilated (Parmu 1969: 359). Again in 1787, when Srinagar was ruled by Mirad Khan (1786–88), there were further clashes between the two creeds; and when one year later, the Shiites started to build new mosques in Zadibal and in Hasanabad, another Shiite locality in Srinagar, the Sunnis aroused the sectarian passions of Muhabbat Khan (a son of Juma Khan Alkozai who ruled Kashmir from 1788 to 1793), who reached the scene with a contingent of Sunni troops. The mosque was demolished, many Shiite homes were looted, and some of their leaders were killed (Parmu 1996: 368). In the following century, relations between the two communities were never harmonious. In recognition of the fact that the Shiites had suffered so much due to the frequent persecutions by the Sunnis, the Maharaja in 1872 compensated them with three lakh44 of rupees (Lawrence 1895: 202). As Mattoo (1988: 152) summarized, The sectarian feelings introduced by Mῑrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt kept the two sections divided throughout our period [the Mughal reign] and during the Afghan rule, it further intensified. This mental dissent never allowed them to unite, and face the common foe jointly.

It was the fourteenth century that saw the beginning of the sociopolitical reorganization of Kashmiri society that led to the Hindu caste system being replaced by Islamic social structures. This particularly involved the transformation of the complex Hindu kram system into the Muslim zāt system that will be described in detail in the next chapter.

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Notes 1. From the seventh to the tenth century a.d., Kashmir was considered a stronghold of

2. 3.

4.

5. 6.

7.

8.

9.

10. 11.

12.

13. 14.

Buddhism. It was still flourishing in the time of Kalhaṇa in the mid-twelfth century before finally disappearing in the fourteenth century (Fuyama 1994; Naudou 1980; Slaje 2007). Kalhaṇa’s Rājataraṅgiṇῑ (KRT: 1:117). Āryāvarta covered approximately the territory between the Himalaya and the Vindhya mountain ranges that separates the subcontinent geographically into northern and southern India (for details, see Kirfel 1967 [1920]: 66). The Kanyakubja Brahmans (see KRT: 1:341–45) are supposed to originate from the Kannauj district in what is today the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. A recent genetic analysis (Mendizabal et al. 2012: 2346, fig. 4) has shown a close link between the Kashmiri Pandits and a people living in the Sindhu River region, which is also thought to have been the location of the mythological Sarasvati River. See also Kaul (1924: 86–92) and Witzel (2008: 67n129). In Mughal times, Persian also became the language of a centralized administration (1528) and educated Paṇḍits became the backbone of bureaucracy (Sender 1988: 31). Jonarāja in his Rājataraṅgiṇī also reported that many gave up their religion in order “to obtain the favour of the king” (quoted in Rafiqi 1977: 213). Persian then prevailed as the administrative language as well as the language of the court, until it was replaced by Urdu in 1889 during the Dogra dynasty (Weber 2007). For details, see also Bamzai (1994: 2:479), Kalla (1985), Lawrence (1895: 39–40), Madan (1998), and Rai (2004: 37–38). However, even when Paṇḍits were employed by the government, until the early nineteenth century, they were predominantly bilingual and had a mastery of both Sanskrit and Persian (Walter Slaje, pers. comm.). “Therefore the Karkuns have arrogated to themselves the higher position in the Paṇḍit social hierarchy. The gor [gurus] are regarded as inauspicious, mean and greedy. . . . The acknowledged superiority of the karkun was based on the socioeconomic position. Correspondingly, the denigration of the gur has been grounded on the perception that the priest, in fact, is a beggar” (Sender 1988: 23). The word gor is derived from the Sanskrit term guru, and kārkun is derived from the Persian word for civil servant, revenue collector, and so forth (Rai 2004: 37n59). For details, see also Madan (1994: 182–83). For a list, see Koul (1924: appendix 6, pp. 92–95). According to Mohan (1981: 195), “the Ḍāmaras were not the feudal barons but . . . they were the landed aristocracy who had attained their status by acquisition of wealth and not by the king’s grants of jāgῑrs or the condition of service tenure” (for details regarding the Ḍāmaras, see Mohan 1981: 193–210, 330–37). In Sanskrit, the term kulaparamparācārakrama (kula, family + paramparā, succession + ācāra, precept + krama, arrangement) stands for “family tradition” (Temple 1924/1990: 10, 247). Communicated by Pandit Anand Koul (1924: 20). For a problematic and confusing classification of pre-Islamic and Islamic krams, see Wani (2004: 31–36), who also does not relate their transformation to and their rel-

Kashmir’s Early History and the Conversion to Islam

15. 16.

17. 18.

19.

20.

21. 22. 23.

24. 25. 26.

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evance for the meaning of Muslim zāt as surnames. The term zāt is discussed solely with regard to its connotation as the “innate nature, occupation, culture, and ethnicity and religious background of the group” (pp. 248–49). For a discussion, see M. I. Khan (1997: 22). This tribe lived in the Ili Basin. After a.d. 690, Suyab became their urban center. The Türgesh gained supremacy within the confederation, so that Bagha Tarqan Ochırlıq (Indic: Vajrapani) was chosen as their leader (699–706). He was succeeded by his son Saqal (Chinese: So-ko; 706–711), who, after defeating the T’ang, declared himself Qaghan. By this time, the Western Turks were subject to pressure from the Eastern Turks, the Chinese, Arab incursions, and Tibet. After 715, when the Eastern Turks withdrew, one of Saqal’s generals, Su-lu (717–738), possibly the person named Abu Muzahim in Muslim sources, led the Türgesh and declared himself Qaghan. In 722 and 724 he defeated the Arabs, and in 722 he formed an alliance with the T’ang. By 730, the Türgesh represented a serious threat to the Arabs, but in 737 they were defeated at Khjaristan. Thus, for the first quarter of the eighth century, it is correct to speak about Türgesh supremacy. However, there is no indication that they were Muslims (for details, see Golden 1992: 138–41) (kindly communicated to me by Peter Andrews). Possibly, factions of the populations still living in parts of today’s northern Pakistan (e.g., Chilas Gilgit and Astor) are speakers of Dardic languages. The term mleccha has no distinct meaning. It is an onomatopoeic term and, analogous to the Greek barbaros, merely denotes people who speak an alien language that cannot be understood. Furthermore, the word turuṣka can also be employed in terms of extreme brutality, irrespective of an actor’s ethnic or linguistic background. Thus, Jonarāja called King Harṣa, the iconoclast, a turuṣka ( JRT: 598), thereby using the same denotation as he did when referring to Sūha Bhaṭṭa, a converted Kashmiri Brahman who had severely persecuted the Hindus ( JRT: 609). As Wink (1996: 238) surmised quoting Stein (RT: 7:1171), these ḍāmaras, as a collective identifiable category of landholders, date their rise to the early medieval period. Most of the ḍāmaras were probably originally recruited from the agriculturalist population of Kashmir that bore the tribal name of Lavanyas. For a comprehensive analysis, see Hangloo (2008) and Ishaq Khan (2008). For a comprehensive discussion of these biases, see Slaje (2004). Hindu Ṛṣis existed long before the Muslim Ṛṣi saints. It was Shaḫ Nūr ud-Dῑn Ṛṣi who renewed the tradition when he founded a Muslim Ṛṣi order. He played an important role in the Islamization of the country and is still famous in Kashmir, where he is popularly known under the name Nand Ṛṣi or Alamdār-e-Kashmir (Gull 2003: 12; Lawrence 1895: 288). But it has also been claimed that Persian, widely understood in the region, was the language for teaching Islam used by the Sayyids. The Sayyids from the Surawardiyya order were also followed by others from the Naqšbandi- and the Qādirῑyya orders. For the early Sufi orders, the Kubraviyy and the Suhravardiyya, see Gull (2003) and Schimmel (1975). For a detailed description of the life and an analysis of the works of Mir Sayyid ‘Āli Hamadānῑ, see Hasan (1959: 55–65), Meier (1950), Teufel (1962), and E.Ir (2012).

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27. Elias (2000: 399). 28. In these early days, especially among the Sufi orders, there was no clear distinction

29. 30.

31. 32. 33. 34.

35. 36. 37.

38. 39.

40. 41.

or differentiation between Sunni and Shia. Therefore, the question whether ‘Āli Hamadānῑ was a Sunnite or a Shiacannot be answered with certainty, and there is probably little sense in making a clear-cut assignment (Elias 2000; Hassan 1959: 57–58; J. Kak 2008, Singh 2000: 17). For a comprehensive analysis, see Khan (1997). In the words of Khan (2001: 3), “[In Kashmir] the indigenous mystic movement of the Hindu converts to Islam, known as the Rishi movement, arose not only as a reaction against the manifold abuses or the abuse of the caste-ridden Brahmanic society but also as an offspring of the teaching of a Shaivite yogini Lal Ded, and the Kubravi Sufi Sayyid ‘Ali Hamadani.” Converging Sufi mystics with Shaivite philosophy, the Ṛṣis were venerated by Muslims and Hindus alike and are still held in high esteem in Kashmir today (Khan 2004). The most famous Ṛṣis were Sheikh Noor-ud-Din (1378–1442), with his popular name Nand Ṛṣi and Lāl Ded, also known as Laleshwari, Lalita, or Lallā (for details, see Khan 1997, 2001, 2004; Madan 2008: 12–13; especially for Lāl Ded, see Ahmed 2002; Kaul 1973; Kotru 1990; Temple 1924; and for Nand Ṛṣi, see Gauhar 1988). Pandita (2004: 138) inferred that his real name was Mir Šams ud-Din Āraki and that he came from Arak in western Iran. See Algar (2012), Elias (2000), and Margoliouth (1936: 961); for a comprehensive account, see Bashir (2001) and Pandit (2009). For a detailed description of this period, see Sufi (1948: 1:217–38). For details, see E.I. (1978) for “Kashmir” and E.I. (1986) for “Kubrā”; see also Elias (2000), Hangloo (2008), Kak (2008), Khan (2008), Lawrence (1895: 284–96), Rieck (1995), and Sing (2000). It is still not clear where the Chaks came from. Most authors consider that they came to Kashmir in about the tenth century (Parmu 1969: 245–49). For the complex relationship between the Hamdani-Kubraviyya order, the Nūrbakhshiyya, and the Shia faith, see Elias (2000). In the Bahāristān-i Shāhῑ (12.39), it is reported that “Malik Haidar did all this [visiting the tomb and praising Šams ud-Din Iraki] just to please Malik Regi Chak. In fact, in his heart he bore malice and enmity against the order (Noor Bakhshiyyeh), of which he gave a proof when the opportunity came.” Sultan Fath Shah reigned from 1486 to 1493, then from 1505 to 1514, and again from 1515 to 1516. “By ‘Rafizis,’ Mīrzā Ḥaidar means Imami Shi’ites; by ‘Shi’ites,’ he means the extremist form of Quizilbash Shi’ism propagated by the Safavid Shah Ismail and his Turcoman followers” (Tarikh-i-Rashidi 1996: 262n5). It is interesting to note that Ḥaidar Duġlāt’s rule in Kashmir is mentioned in the Tarikh-i-Firishta (book 2: 89, 170), but that persecutions are not reported there. For details on the plunder and persecution of Shiites, the destruction of their houses, the burning of the khānqāh, and the desecration of the grave of Mir Shamsu’d-Dīn Irāqi, see Bahāristān-i-Shāhī (1991: 160n104) and Tārīkh-i-Ḥasan Khuihāmi (1954: 254).

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42. Clashes occurred especially in the years 1622, 1636, and 1667, but the worst occurred in the years 1685–86 (Mattoo 1988: 150–51).

43. Next to nothing known is about the Bombas. They seem to have been a Shiite population of the Jhelum valley who claimed that they were of the Khureshi tribe and descended from Ali, the son of Mohammad (Lawrence 1909: 34). Lawrence (1895: 309) also wrote that they said that they came from Turkey, and although they were “originally a warlike tribe, they have degenerated into a feeble, ridiculous, and most pitiable condition.” (see also Ferguson (1961: 39–43). 44. 1 lakh = 105 rupees (Rs).

3  The Social Organization of Contemporary Kashmiri Muslim Society Kashmiri Muslims and the Broader Society This chapter delineates the social structure of contemporary Kashmir, focusing particularly on how lake dwellers, the so-called “Hanz,” are embedded within the broader society. These lake dwellers are composed mainly of “Demb Hanz,” a term encompassing the households and people who live on the lake islands or peninsulas. The term ḍēmb signifies “muddy” and “moist land” and refers especially to the artificially raised fields that will be described in chapter 5. Many Demb Hanz are market gardeners, mainly Shias, who call themselves zamῑndār* (owners of zamῑn* [land]). But others who also live on the islands earn their money away from the lake, especially in Srinagar, for instance, as craftsmen, workers, minor clerks, or taxi drivers. In addition, there are the Sunni owners of tourist houseboats and also the “Gad Hanz” (gaḍ meaning fish)—a small population of Sunni fishermen who live on the islands and on the lake’s shore. Together with the other Muslims in the valley, the Sikhs, and the few Hindu families (Paṇḍits) who still remain after the dreadful years of militancy in the late 1980s and 1990s, they form the broader Kashmiri society. But there are also the Bakkarwal and Gujars, mainly nomadic herders, who spend the summer in the higher

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Figure 3.1. Nesting positions of the different communities of Kashmiris. Figure by the author. Note: The lake-dwelling Muslims, the “Hanz” are made up of the “Demb Hanz,” the island dwellers who are mainly market gardeners; the “Hanjis,” owners of the tourist houseboats; and the “Gad Hanz,” fishermen. They all belong to the broader Muslim community that forms, together with Sikhs and Hindus/Paṇḍits, the entire Kashmiri society.

reaches of the valley and migrate in winter to the lower grazing grounds in Jammu.1 Some other small, mainly itinerant communities, such as the Doms, the Nangars, the Galawāns, the Bātals/Watals,2 and the Bhānds, were once found in the valley (Lawrence 1895: 36–38), and a few groups of these still exist.3 According to the 1901 census, 75 percent of Kashmiris were Muslims and 24 percent Hindus (MKL 1908). The census from 1941 listed 20 percent Hindus, 77 percent Muslims, and 3 percent Buddhists and Sikhs (Bose 2005: 307). Later, according to the 1981 census, in the Kashmir valley proper, there were 95 percent Muslims and merely 4 percent Hindus (Madan 2008: 24, quoting Joshi 1999: 451)—the remaining 1 percent being Sikhs.4 Lawrence (1909: 36–37) reported that the Muslims are divided into four groups: the Sayyids, Mughals, Pathans, and Sheikhs. The Sayyids claim to be descendants of the Prophet’s family. They, along with the Beig and the Pathans, are the offspring of Muslim families who do not descend from converted Kashmiri Hindus. As Ašraf, they all enjoy the highest prestige (Lawrence 1909: 36). The Ajlaf,5 with names like Bhat, Pandit, Koul, Naik, Ryosh/

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Rishi, and Aitu, still bear testimony to their families having been Brahmans before conversion. Others with names such as Magre, Tantre, Dhar, Dangar, Raina, Rathor, Thakur, or Naik indicate that they are descendants from the Kshatriya varna (Lawrence 1909: 36). The Sheikhs constitute the great mass of the village people who are thought to be the “natives of the country,” the offspring of converted low Hindu castes who, for some time after their conversion to Islam, still retained the Hindu custom of caste endogamy and gotra exogamy (Lawrence 1895,: 306; Sharma 1983: 107–8).

The Term Za¯t and Family Names among Kashmiri Muslims Underlying the general divide of today’s Muslim society into Sunnites and Shiites, the term zāt (which is used in many Muslim societies in India) demarcates smaller social units and family names.6 It seems that the term zāt came into use in Mughal times to designate specific “ethnic” groups or occupational castes (Sanderson 2009: 100) that were assigned specific duties vis-à-vis the ruling class.7 However, at the end of the nineteenth century, Paṇḍits and Muslims alike used mainly the kram names to designate their respective families. This was indicated by Walter Lawrence (1895: 304), who discussed only different krams used for “family appellation”—he did not mention the term zāt. However, about a century later, when Madan (1995: 245) described the social organization of the inhabitants of a Kashmiri village, he reported that the term zāt is used by Paṇḍits as well as by Muslims. He explained that the term denotes “birth,” as does the term jāti, the Hindi term for caste,8 but that the Kashmiris . . . use the term zāt in a broader sense to connote essence or inherent nature. Bad-zāt is a term of abuse and is used to condemn an evilnatured or mean person rather than to refer to lowly birth, which would seem to be the primary meaning of the term in the original Arabic-Persian.

And further on, he stated, Several [of his informants] interpreted the word zāti as meaning “at the root or base,” which was further paraphrased as “at or by birth.” One might translate this statement to mean that one’s essential nature is endowed upon one by the circumstances of birth. The notion of zāt is genealogical, but stands for more than the fact of birth. (Madan 1995: 251)

It can be assumed that in Mughal times, many zāt names became equivalent to the kram names that were often related to a family’s occupation. They were found mainly among the so-called nāngārs,9 the members of the nonagricultural, artisan groups such as the khār (blacksmiths), navid (barbers), or gūru (milkmen, cowherds) (Bamzai 1987: 21; Lawrence 1895: 304–10 and table 1, p. 28; Rai 2004: 38). Usually, these names were maintained after

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conversion to Islam and then referred to as the family’s zāt. The names of non-nāngār Paṇḍits often became distorted. Lawrence (1895: 310) gave an example of a man with the name Ahmad Dhar who changed it to Ahmadju or Ahdju (which today would be written with the appositional suffix “joo” as Ahmadjoo or Ahdjoo). In some cases, the optional “j” was also dropped in names such as Buktoo, Dunoo, Dubloo, Guchoo, Langoo, or Shungloo.10 Most probably, the suffix “oo” can be understood as a suffix of politeness, equivalent to the additional “ji” in a Hindi/Urdu name. As said, among the Muslims of today, the term zāt is usually used if referring to the family name, but many still know the term kram, and old people sometimes use it for the designation of a family. When I asked about the difference between the two terms, I was sometimes told that “there is no difference: kram is Kashmiri and zāt is Urdu.” The most important religious and social differentiation among the Muslims is the Sunni–Shia divide, whereby the Sunnites follow Hanafi law and the Shias follow Shafai law (Bamzai 1987: 23; Lawrence 1895: 284). Most of the administrative units, the mohallahs, especially those on the lake, are divided into two sections, one of which is occupied mainly or totally by Sunni families, the other by Shia. However, in daily life, the divide does not show any strict social demarcation. For instance, even though there are some graveyards reserved for one or the other creed, many are used by both, with only different sections being reserved for either the Sunni or Shia. Moreover, the Hazratbal Shrine and the Juma Masjid, where the Imams are Sunni, are attended by members and families of both factions, and many families traditionally venerate certain pῑrs (Sufi masters or spiritual guides) who are consulted for guidance and help. However, whereas Sunni families revere many pῑrs from different families, all Shias are the followers (murῑd) of either the Ansari family of Srinagar or the Agha family of the Safavi dynasty of Budgam. Both families exert a profound influence on their communities. The founder of the former family, Mulla Aalim Ansari, influenced by the teaching of the great seat of Shia learning in Najaf (Iraq), already came to Kashmir in about 1450. The latter family is descended from Mir Shams ud-Din Iraki (1481–1526), a saint of the Nurbakhshiyya order. In 1962, the rivalry between these two families resulted in a split within the Shia community and led to different subsects ( firqas). The followers of the Ansari family are the founders of the Firqa-e-Qadimi (the older sect), whereas those following the Safavi family of Budgam are the founders of the Firqa-e-Jadid (the younger sect), also called Jadidis. In the following years, due to internal succession quarrels, the Qadimis then split further into two new factions, the Abbasis and the Iftikharis, who have remained on opposing sides in Kashmir politics ever since: the Abbasis, who had formed the Anjuman-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimin, advocated the “right of self-determination

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for Kashmiris”; and the Iftikharis, who had formed the Shia Association Party, toed the establishment line. Following the split in the Qadimis, the followers of the Agha family of Budgam became the largest Shia subsect. The patriarch of the family, Agha Syed Yusuf al-Mosavi al Safvi, known as Agha Sahab of Budgam, held the reins of family firmly in his hands until he died in 1982. After his death, a bitter feud erupted between his son Agha Fazlullah and his cousin Agha Sayd Mustafa. Both the Congress Party and the National Conference (NC) played a key role in this split, with the former backing Mustafa and the NC supporting Fazlullah. And again, further divisions took place when Agha Mustafa’s two sons joined opposite political camps. The elder, Agha Syed Hassan, took sides with the Hurriyat Conference, whereas the younger, Agha Mehdi, joined the Congress Party in 1996 (for a comprehensive account, see Haider 2009). Due to these internal quarrels beginning with the main split into the Qadimis and the Jadidis and the subsequent splits and their associations with opposing political parties in Kashmir, both have lost much of the trust and support they previously enjoyed in the Shia community, and many young people say that they are of no great importance to them. Talking to members of the Shia community reveals that they are all aware of the century-old Sunni dominance that, they say, can still be felt in the valley. For instance, until today, none of the civilian governments have lifted the ban on the Muharram processions on Ashura11 (banned under the banner of “Ittehad-ul Muslimeen,” an element of the Hurriyat Conference), first introduced in 1990 with the onset of the anti-India movement by the state government then led by Governor Jagmohan. Since then, the ban has often been disobeyed, as it was in February 2006, for instance, when clashes between police and mourners occurred. At this event, 150 mourners were taken into custody, and 30 others were injured when the police tried to disperse the procession (GK, 08.02.2006). On 23 November 2012 as well, police broke up a Muharram procession in different parts of Srinagar, and scores of Shia mourners were injured with dozens being arrested (GK, 24.11.2012). On 22 October 2015, the Anjuman-e-Ittehad-ul-Muslimin patron, Maulana Muhammad Abbas Ansari, was scheduled to lead the traditional procession despite governmental curbs and the procession being banned. When the procession was held anyway, mourners were teargassed by police and paramilitary forces (GK, 22.10.2015; KT, 22.10.2015; KO, 22.10.2015). And again in October 2016, the government stopped and prevented the Muharram procession (GK, 09. and 10.11.2016; KO, 10.10.2016). It should also be mentioned that while many Sunnis feel a political and religious attachment to Pakistan, the Shia population feels closer to Iran. This is demonstrated by many posters showing Sayyid Ruhollah Khomeini, Ali Khamenei, and Hassan Rouhani in Shia-dominated quarters (image 3.1).

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Image 3.1. Poster showing Iranian leaders next to the Floating Market. Photo by the author. (Inscription: “What will this world give us today as the same world did not give Hussain a burial shroud?”12)

This reveals a certain dilemma. From the Islamic perspective, according to the officially aspired religious-political correctness, Sunnis and Shias are supposed to be, and should be, regarded as equal. In this vein, when I, as an outsider, sometimes asked about some traits that I know to differ between the two communities, I was told that “there are no Shias and Sunnis—there are only Muslims.” But in practice, as the examples show, be it in marriage arrangements or in other negotiations in the socioeconomic or political sphere, a certain bias can be observed. All this, however, becomes irrelevant when fighting for independence flares up, leading to brutal counterstrikes by the police and the Indian army (as happened in the summer and early autumn of 2016). Then “Shia–Sunni Unity [Is] the Need of the Hour” (KO, 05.10.2016).

On Marriage and Hierarchies As described, in pre-Muslim times, certain marriage restrictions were practiced. For instance, the priests (Gor) were endogamous, and it can be assumed that the different jātis (castes) of the Karkūn were ranked hierarchically along an ascribed purity–pollution dimension that would imply more or less restrictive marriage arrangements.

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With the Islamization of the Kashmiris, such social hierarchies slowly disappeared; but in earlier times, they were still much more pronounced, as Khan (1986: 196) remarked: It is true that in spite of this development [the conversion and the assumption of Muslim names], the domb [village watchmen], dambel maets [ecstatic dancers], hanjis [boat people], etc. continued to be discriminated against in marriage, but in contrast to their ancestors’ position in the Hindu social structure they were not socially ostracized or reviled.

Likewise, Bruce (1911: 34–35)13 wrote that a certain hierarchy is reported among the boat people, and that all these groups are endogamous, because the boatmen . . . called Hanjis . . . have their class distinctions. For instance, the floating-garden cultivators and those who reap and transport in their barges the harvest of the lake—the water-nut—are superior to the other bargee folk. The passenger boatmen are lower still, and, lowest of all, the fishermen.

But slowly such hierarchies disappeared, and with them most marriage restrictions, so that below the Sunni–Shia divide, only a few hierarchical differences are known today, and these do not feature prominently in daily life. Even with those that are meaningful for the choice of a bride or groom, “the Muslims placed informal restrictions, not sanctioned by their faith but prevalent in custom, on intermarriage between zāt” (Bamzai 1994). In fact, to a certain extent, zāt endogamy is considered desirable, with preference being given to marriages between a son and his father’s brother’s daughter (FBD) and father’s sister’s daughter (FZD). If this is not possible or eligible, any other zāt can be chosen. But more often than not, the occupations of the bride’s and the groom’s families are the same (Lawrence 1895: 304; see also Madan 1995: 250). Of course, marriage, with few exceptions, is restricted to members of either the Shia or the Sunni community,14 but even marriages between the two creeds are not extremely rare—especially among the townspeople. When I asked how this is possible, the answer was usually, “Because it was a love marriage,” which shows that even this divide is not of utmost importance and that parents in Kashmir often comply with the wishes of their children. In some cases, even the Shia market gardener families, who usually perceive the community of the fishermen as being at the bottom of the social hierarchy of all lake dwellers, will accept a Sunni Gad Hanz girl as a marriage partner for their son (when he has fallen in love with her).15 Such a family then has to overcome not only the Sunni–Shia divide but also the class barrier between their own relatively high status and the low rank of the girl’s family. In such a case, the family of the groom may become exposed to some gossip, but they will never be ostracized or stigmatized by the community. Apart from these exceptions, it can be said that the choice

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of the marriage partner today depends more on the prestige of the respective families, which is mainly contingent on wealth and less dependent on the position of a zāt in the social hierarchy.16 This surely has gained weight in recent times, but as Lawrence (1895: 310) already observed, “Wealth alone commands position, and poverty at once degrades a family.” It seems to me that the absolute majority of family names, the zāt notations, are independent of whether the bearer is a city or a lake dweller. Also, from names alone, there are only some cases in which it is clear whether a family belongs to the Sunni or the Shia community. Moreover, a zāt name that connotes a profession such as khar (blacksmith) or navid (barber) does not indicate the occupation practiced. Of course there are exceptions: for instance, when I once came back from visiting the fisherman community, I told a friend that I was astonished to find that all the fishermen families belong to only one zāt, and that they are all “Dhar.” My friend vehemently contradicted me, saying that it is impossible because the fishermen cannot be “Dhar.” What had happened was that I had confused the high-ranking Dhar (formerly members of the high-ranking Bharadvāja gotra of the Hindus) with the Dar, a zāt that is often found among the lower middle and lower classes. It was often remarked in conversations that one given family (zāt) is highly respected and positioned above most other ones. When I asked whether a definite ranking assignment exists between the various zāts, all informants concurred only that the primordial Muslim families, for instance the Sayyids, enjoy the highest reputation and that a very low or even the lowest position is often attributed to the Sheikhs. Generally, however, it was said that the assignment to a high rank depends mainly on whether a family can, due to its affluence, exert political power that, in turn, again results in an economic advantage. This, it was said, also holds true for a Sheikh family. When we discussed the hierarchical position in relation to each other of many of the different zāt or the association of a given zāt to one of the two Muslim creeds, there were, with only very few exceptions, no consistent answers. To gain a better understanding of the situation, I conducted a pilesorting experiment. I asked four Sunni and five Shia informants to arrange “zāt cards” hierarchically and also according to the Sunni–Shia divide. There were two outcomes to my experiment: First, only very few zāt were related exclusively (and in most cases wrongly) to either the Sunni or the Shia community; in most cases, the zāt were related to both denominations. Second, it showed, and all the informants agreed, that the different zāt (with very few exceptions; i.e., the Sayyids) can be allocated at most to one of three categories: a high, very prestigious ranking; a middle ranking; and a low ranking. And even then, there was very little agreement between the sorters. This showed that, in fact, there is no pronounced hierarchy between the zāt. On the one hand, this may reflect the high value allocated to the equality of

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all members of the Kashmiri ummah; the unity of believers; but on the other hand and more importantly, that the rank of a given family depends not so much on its zāt, but predominantly on its economic situation.17 On Dal Lake, the situation is different. Here again, it is usually not possible to know whether the bearer is a Sunni or a Shia from the zāt names, but a divide regarding occupation and ownership and creed is of importance. As mentioned, about 85 to 90 percent of all market gardeners are Shia, but all the owners of houseboats are Sunni who often express their superiority over Shia people. When I asked why there are no Shia owners of houseboats, the answer was usually twofold. The first indicated that “the Shia people are too poor and thus they cannot afford to buy a houseboat.” But when I remarked that everybody knows that there are extremely rich zamῑndārs and then asked whether a boat owner in need would sell his boat to such a rich Shia, the answer was usually just, “No.” Pressing further, I inquired what would happen if a Shia were to offer much more money than Sunni prospects—the answer again was a “No,” finally followed by the explanation: “The houseboats will always stay only in our [Sunni] community!”

The Problem of Ascribed Misnomers Identity, as we know from the abundant literature on the subject, can be either ascribed, achieved or both, whereby the boundaries between ascription and achievement are often fluid. —Rao 1998: 270

As already described in the first chapter, since time immemorial, the many waterways in the valley have been of utmost importance for the transport of goods and people. The earliest mention of people living on the lakes and waterways in Kashmir uses the Sanskrit term dhῑvara. It is ascribed to a fisher as well as to a boatman and is found in Kalhaṇa’s and Jonarāja’s Rājataraṅginī.18 But one can also find the word dhivar, which is conventionally still used in Hindi and denotes a “fisherman or a sailor” (BSDH 1971). Today, however, it is neither used nor known in either Kashmiri or Urdu.

The Term Hanz and Its Compounds Nowadays, people apply the generic term hanz; but when this usage started is unknown. The term signifies “all boatmen who live on the Dal, on any other lake or on the rivers in the valley” (Madan 1995: 247; also 1972: 111). To the best of my knowledge, it is not to be found in any of the classical texts.

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Sanskrit does, however, have the term hāṇḍa, signifying a badly behaving lout,19 and this may be the root of the term hanz. Sanskrit was the dominant language in formal discourse until about the middle of the fourteenth century, when Islam became firmly established (Kachru 2008: 309). Nonetheless, even after conversion, the various forms of official documents, reports, etc. which are contained in the Lokaprakāsha, a handbook for Kashmīri administration routines, are drawn up in a curious Sanskrit jargon, full of Persian and Arabic words, which must have become current in Kashmīr soon after the introduction of Islām. (Sufi 1948–49: 1:78)

Therefore, it is plausible that the Sanskrit term hāṇḍa was transformed into the Kashmiri term hanz and came to be used as a nickname. This interpretation is particularly widespread among the town and village people who apply the term to all lake dwellers,20 often with negative undertones. In Srinagar, for instance, parents often scold noisy and quarrelsome children with, “Don’t behave like a hanz.” At the end of the nineteenth century, Doughty (1901: 136–37) was possibly exaggerating the negative connotations related to the market gardeners of the Dal when she wrote, These gardeners are among the most prosperous folk in Kashmir; they have always plenty to eat themselves, and are always certain of good prices for the surplus that they are able to sell, a condition of things which compensates for the supreme contempt in which their class is held by the members of other classes, for these people in their gardening operations handle “that which is unclean,”21 and consequently are practically “outcasts” from any decent society.

Here it can also be mentioned that other terms for classifying regional or occupational groupings are used in Kashmir; and, depending on the context, they can have a negative connotation. For instance, lake dwellers and villagers alike use the Hindi/Urdu term chatur to denote the city people, a word that means clever, adroit, but also cunning and sly. In turn, the city people as well as the lake dwellers call villagers mainly the cultivators of soil, grūst. Depending on the context, this term can also have a negative undertone, meaning “stupid.” In general, it seems that at end of the nineteenth century, the term hanz22 was usually used in its compound forms for the different occupational groups of people living with their boats on bodies of water. As indicated in Grierson and Shastrie’s (1916/1932) dictionary, the term āyěr-hönzü referred to a boatman who lives by fishing and catching animals; the term ḍữ´ga-hönzü to a boatman with a “kind of covered boat for passengers with their baggage and servants, and in which the passengers also live”; and the term bahātsihönzü to a cargo boatman. Furthermore, a gāḍa-hönz marked a fisher; a görihönzü, a collector of water nuts; and a ḍēmb-hönzü, a cultivator of islands and

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raised fields.23 It can be supposed that before Grierson’s time, even more such terms were in use to denote the various groups of boat people who lost their occupations and vanished after many roads were constructed through the valley in the late part of the nineteenth century. This especially concerns the “Bahāt Hanz” (bahātsi-hönzü) who mainly transported heavy items such as building materials on their huge barges, the bahāts (see image 1.1b), as well as the dā-hönzü, who collected paddy from the villages on the riverbanks for sale in the city. Some of these terms underwent an “Urduization,” as in the case of the collectors of water nuts. Here, the term göri-hönzü was replaced by singhara hanz, with the Kashmiri term for water nut being changed to the Urdu/Hindi term singhara. Other terms mentioned in their dictionary are now forgotten, such as ḍal-khögi that referred to a “special kind of boatman on the Dal, who attends to the cultivation of the . . . floating islands.” These days, most of the different occupational groups with their different types of boats are gone. Nowadays, the term hanz in its compound form exists only for the Dunga Hanz, the people who still live on the old traditional passenger boat, the dunga. These are mainly used as their homes, but they are sometimes also rented out to tourists. Originally, the term Demb Hanz signified only the horticulturalists on the Dal islands with their artificially constructed raised fields, the ḍēmbs. However, since the early twentieth century, more and more families from outside the lake have settled on the islands and on land they have drained and claimed in the muddy regions on the shore. These families have no agricultural land and earn their living as artisans and merchants, or as taxi drivers in Srinagar. Thus, over time, the connotation of the term Demb Hanz has broadened and now denotes all people living on the Dal Lake islands or on the artificial drained headlands that extend from the lakeshores out into open water. To differentiate between all the lake dwellers, to whom applies the superordinate term Demb Hanz, and those who are the market gardeners, the latter are now often referred to and call themselves zamῑndārs, the Persian/Urdu term for a cultivator of land.

The Term Hanji In the travel literature of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, a great number of confusing terms were ascribed to the different populations on the Dal. This relates especially, as described, to the terms Hanz but also to Hanji. The term hanji is not listed in Grierson and Shastrie’s (1916/1932) dictionary of the Kashmiri language. Lawrence (1895: 313–14), however, used both terms, but did not differentiate between the two when referring to the boatmen of Kashmir.

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This term Hanji was always used by the British to connote the “boat people” on the lakes and waterways of the country. Wakefield (1879: 102–3), for instance, wrote, There is, however, another class which deserves a few words for they are numerous and conspicuous with whom visitors to the valley come most in contact. I refer to the “hânjîs,” or boatmen; and as the river, canals, and lakes are the chief highways in the country, it naturally follows that as a body they are numerous and of some importance. They are a fine race, for both men and women have bodies well developed by the hard labor of towing and paddling the boats, which is their means of earning their living. The boats form also their homes, for the greater part of them pass their lives entirely on board, and know no other dwelling-places. They are ready and willing to act as servants to Englishmen; it is always customary to engage a number of them and a boat during one’s stay in the Vale.24

Here, the term refers unambiguously only to the “boat people” as an occupational class. Most probably, the term Hanji came into being when the British applied the Hindi/Urdu suffix of politeness “ji” to the generic term Hanz to address a boatman. Hanz ji then became Hanji, a term that was used in the travel literature of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries for all Dal dwellers. These Hanjis were sometimes even called a “tribe” that was supposed to be partitioned into larger and smaller sections according to the different occupational groups. Thus, for instance, even in 1985, Mam considered the vegetable-growing Demb Hanz as a subgroup of the Hanjis (see also Sanyal 1979: 34–37); and the fishermen, the Gad Hanz, were designated as “Gad Hanjis” by GOISW (1969: 1). Even a recent publication (Rather 2012) dealing predominantly with the market gardeners stated, Hanjis are at present living in and around the lake in different localities, which are commonly known as Mohallahs. . . . Some localities are as big as more than hundreds of households and some are as small as five to ten households only.

When I asked the market gardeners on the Dal about Hanjis, the answer was usually, “There are no Hanjis on the lake.” Only some said that one can call the owners of the tourist houseboats “Houseboat Hanz.” In fact, from all the different classes of so-called Hanjis who once lived from and with their boats used for transporting goods and people, only one class remains: the owners of the big tourist houseboats. When asked, some of them, in fact, state that they are Hanjis. For instance, Abdul Majid Dunoo (2017), the owner of a houseboat, at the end of a short unpublished manuscript (Houseboat—The Heritage of Kashmir) undersigned it with his name followed by “Proud to be a Hanji.” When asked, he also assigned the term to all the owners of the simple dunga-like houseboats moored mainly on the banks of the Jhelum (see image 1.1a). In the next chapter, I shall describe their origin and

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the development of the simple passenger boats to the large tourist houseboats that have played such an important role in Kashmiri tourism on Dal Lake since the end of the nineteenth century.

The Problem of Ascribed Ethnonyms The Terms Mirbahri and Malahari In some nineteenth-century travelers’ accounts, the vegetable gardeners of the lake were referred to as Mirbahris but also as Malaharis or Maliharis, terms that are not known today by the Dal dwellers. The first term signified the Dal dwellers under the control of a superintendent of the lake; and still today, there is a settlement in the Dole Demb region called Mir Behri where the very influential Mir Bahar family lives. Matoo (1988: 128) explained, There were more than 5,700 boats plying in the river Jhelum and its tributaries during the reign of Akbar and Jahāngīr. In his first visit, Akbar wanted to visit the upper division of the valley in a boat and so a large number of beautiful house-boats were afloat on the river Jhelum and the Dal lake. The construction and organisation of this department was assigned to an official called Mīr Baḥarī. It was considered to be a prestigious post. Mullah Maẓḥari a famous poet was appointed by Akbar as Mir Baḥarī [baḥr > Arabic: the sea25].

Still at the end of the nineteenth century in the Report on the Administration of the Jammu and Kashmir State (RAJ&K 1900), the term Mir Bahri was used to refer not only to a special region or to the land owners in general but also to the cultivators of the land: The Mir Bahri tract was measured under Mr. Wingate’s direction in 1888 but the revenue demand was not revised to Mr. Lawrence. . . . The reason for this was mostly found on political considerations; in other words, the most influential families in the city were in many cases, interested in lands and were known to be holding land there almost revenue free. . . . It was seen that both the maps and the records were most unreliable. . . . The reason . . . may be found in the fact that in 1888 the new Settlement had not then won the confidence of the people and the cultivators did not, therefore attend measurement.

In another source mentioning Mir Bahri, the term relates to a specific region where many vegetable growers lived who were known as Maliharis: Mahal Mir Bahri, the area in the neighbourhood of Srinagar was the source of supply of vegetables for the entire population of the city and the Government used to get a handsome income from the vegetable growers. The vegetable growers in the valley were known by the name Maliharis. (Sharma 1983: 132 and n33)

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This term Malihari may derive from the term mala, a polite form (instead of hönzü, cf. Hanz) designating a seaman or a boatman (Grierson and Shastri 1916/1932: 564). In the “Assessment Cess and Taxes in the City in 1836–1837 for the City of Cashmere,” it is listed that the boatmen, called Mirbaharis, had supplied the government with a revenue of 27,000 rupees (Sharma 1983: appendix VI, p. 297). From all these entries, it can be supposed that all the different terms relate to the population of market gardeners and boatmen on the Dal under the superintendence of the Mir Bahri.

Notes 1. See Casimir and Rao (1995, 2008), Rao (1988, 1998, 2000), and Rao and Casimir (1985).

2. These Bātals still existed in the late nineteenth century. Eastwick (1883: 61), for

3.

4.

5. 6. 7.

8. 9. 10.

11.

instance, wrote, “Europeans take their ideas of Kashmír women from the Bátals, who are very degraded, and many of whom are dancing-girls. The lower Bátals eat carrion, the rest skin carcasses.” Today the term Watal generally signifies “sweepers.” Only a few groups of Bhānds exist today. They work as comedians who make fun of specific institutions, current political or social problems (such as corruption), or certain individuals (Goswami 1988; Swami 1998a; Uzair 2013). Here is not the place to describe the modern history of how the country was divided into two regions, one administered by Pakistan and the other by India, after partition in 1947 and the events that took place surrounding the struggle for independence and the rise of militancy. The literature on the “Kashmir Problem” is vast and often biased. For analyses, see Hönig (2000) and Rao (1999, 2017). Bhan (2013), Bose (2005), Reynolds (2005, 2017), Sharma (2002), and Wani (2013) can be recommended, and Madan (2008) provides a comprehensive account. Both terms, widely known and used in the Islamic world, are not used in Kashmir. See, for instance, Ahmad (1976) for a comparable situation in Uttar Pradesh. In Kashmir, in Mughal times, the term was used differently than it is today. As Kaw (2001: 271) wrote, “The ruling class formed one . . . agency which were qualified by their zāt and sawār ranks. The zāt denoted the personal pay of the official and sawār signified the amount due to him on account of the maintenance of the troop. In both cases, however, the amount was disbursed in terms of the revenue assignments called jāgīrs (see also Habib 1999: 240, 299; Morland 1998: 213–214). Even today, some government departments in Srinagar still list the family names of, for example, landowners under the heading “caste.” Literally “those in search of bread” (Madan 1995: 245), from the Persian nān [bread]. The u/oo ending in Kashmiri names may derive from an older linguistic level (Sanskrit) in which the ending “-uka” signifies a possessive suffix (Walter Slaje, pers. comm.). For a detailed classification and description of “caste names” among Muslims, see Sharma (1983: 105–8). Commemorating as a day of mourning the martyrdom of the Third Imam, Hassan bin Ali, the grandson of Muhammad who died in the Battle of Karbala in a.d. 680.

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12. “Martyrs are not washed and are buried in the clothes in which they met their death” (Massé 1938: 1:95).

13. See, also Sanyal (1979: 34, 93–94). 14. The marriage procedure und rituals in the Sunni and Shia communities are princi-

15. 16.

17.

18. 19.

20. 21.

22. 23. 24.

pally the same, the only exception being that music should not be played at a Shia marriage festivity. As I shall report later, the Sunni houseboat owners never intermarry with either the market gardeners or the fishermen. It should be noted that this practice differs from that of the Muslim mobile herders of Kashmir, the Bakkarwal, as Rao (1998: 130–51; see also Casimir and Rao 1995) has shown. For them, zāt endogamy, especially among the big zāt, is the norm. A certain inconsistency is evident when Wani (2004: 31–32), on the one hand, differentiates between “prestigious traditional krāms” and “krāms assumed by socially low groups”; but on the other hand, Wani also writes, “Among Muslims there was . . . nothing like division of labor, as laid down by caste system. Nor did the religious section look down upon the working class professions” (p. 286). Walter Slaje, pers. comm. Walter Slaje, pers. comm. Grierson and Shastri (1916/1932: 341) remarked, “The boatmen of Kashmīr have a very bad reputation for morality shamelessness, disrespect, lawlessness, and foul and abusive language.” For other, but rather far-fetched, explanations for the origins of the lake dwellers and the term hanz, see Mam (1986: 143–45). The old market gardeners on the lake still remember that, when they were young, the waterweeds and the mud from the lake were mixed with human excrement to produce the compost that was then mixed with the agricultural soil. In his Kashmiri dictionary, Neve (2007: 5) translates the term “hānz” as “boatman” like Elmsley (1872: 131) and Lawrence, who call them Hánj or Hánz. Moreover, among the different potherbs (hāk) cultivated in the valley, the one from the Dal is called “hanz hāk.” The French scientist V. Jacquemont (1831: 106) described the behavior of the boatmen when he reached Srinagar, “who quarreled for the precedence of one boat over the other and hit each other over the head with the oars as they passed. I expressed my surprise to those who surrounded me, but they said it was the custom of the Kashmiri boatmen to fight among themselves and that it would not be fair to stop them.” After that (but in contrast to Wakefield), the so-called Hanjis were usually described in British travel books as rude and quarrelsome people who use a vulgar, often obscene language. Eastwick (1883: 61), in a typical assessment, wrote, “The Hánjís, or boatmen, live for months together in their boats. They are lying, greedy, and cowardly” (see also Drew 1875/1976: 180; Ujfalvy 1884: 139). This prejudice, which still exists today among most of the townspeople and houseboat owners, now relates mainly to the shikarawalas (Khan 1997: 196). During Mughal times, among the upper classes, and especially the nobility, there was a negative attitude toward the Kashmiri lower classes. Jahangir (1569–1626), for instance, referred in his memoirs to “the animal-like Kashmiris who were employed in picking the flowers” (Tuzuk-i-Jahangῑrῑ 1909: 93), and in Abu’l Fażl’s Ā’ῑn-i Akbarῑ

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(1891: 360–361), written in 1589/1590, it is said that the owners of the floating gardens are “fraudulent.” 25. According to Briggs (1829: 2:260, fn.), “Ameer-al-Bahr, or commander of the sea is an ancient Arabian title, and answers so entirely to that of an admiral” (see also n139).

4  The Market Gardeners of Dal Lake Early Accounts In the Beginning: Cultivating the Marshy Regions in Kashmir To the best of my knowledge, there is no mention of a horticultural population living on Dal Lake or its shores in either Kalhana’s Rājataraṅgiṇῑ or any other early account on Kashmir. Nonetheless, it is interesting to note that Al-Biruni (973–ca. 1050), a member of the entourage of Mahmud of Ghazni who invaded the country in 1015, mentions plantations in the swampy areas in Kashmir: When the Jailam [ Jhelum] has left the mountains, and has flowed two days’ journey, it passes through Addishtân [Srinagar]. Four farsakh [20–24 km]1 farther on it enters a swamp2 of one square farsakh. The people have their plantations on the border of this swamp, and on such parts of it as they manage to reclaim. (Sachau 1964: 207)

Here, in a comparable analysis of Al-Biruni’s and Aurel Stein’s observations, Slaje (2005: 26) commented: The interesting point is that Al-Bīrūnī, in his account (ad 1030) based on local informants, also refers to the marshy banks of the Mahāpadmasaras [the Volur Lake] by saying that “the people have their plantations on the borders of this swamp, and on such parts of it as they manage to reclaim.” AUREL STEIN

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made a similar comment: “The marshes and peaty meadows merge almost imperceptibly into its area.” If we compare the three statements made on the lake’s swamps and marshes in the Mokṣopāya . . . by Al- Bīrūnī . . . and by AUREL STEIN . . . to each other, it becomes clear that they all must have been based on independent direct perception.

Unfortunately, Al-Biruni does not say what these people were growing on their plots. However, it can be inferred that the plots were quite small, so that laying out paddies would not have been profitable and only vegetables would have been grown there. In those days, the horticulturalists certainly belonged to a poor faction of society, and it can be supposed that, as Al-Bῑrunῑ mentions, in their endeavors to enlarge their small fields, they “manage[d] to reclaim parts” of the swamps. By building up these parts with plant material and earth, they would thus raise these relatively dry plots up above the water line. This may have been the beginning of the agrarian strategy of building “raised fields.” One can speculate that they also cultivated some vegetables on reedvegetated, more or less floating plots in the shallow water that was then the starting point for the construction of “floating gardens.” As Hangloo (2008: 109) observed, before the fourteenth century, the amount of arable land in the valley of Kashmir was rather meager, and that “much of this land was given in lavish grants as religious and secular agraharas to Brahmans and other officials of the state respectively.” It seems that in the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, the edges of lakes and rivers were rarely cultivated if at all. In his Ta’riḫ-i Rašῑdῑ, Mῑrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt (1499– 1551) disclosed that “crops do not do well [on the edges of rivers and lakes] because of excessive moisture, and so they are left uncultivated” (quoted in Hangloo 2008: 66).3 Some information on market gardens emerges only for the next century. In his Ta’riḫ-i Kashmir, written in 1620–21, Haidar Mālik Chādūrah mentioned that the most famous vegetable gardens were located around the city of Srinagar on the banks of Dal Lake.4 During the period of Mughal rule (1526–1858), Mattoo (1988: 43) has reported in general that “vegetable cultivation was extensive and varied all over the Suba [a province, a large division in the Mughal Empire] but it was more common in the valley.”

The Origin of Raised Fields and Floating Gardens: An Educated Guess As reported above, it can be assumed that market gardeners have been cultivating vegetables on the banks of Dal Lake since at least the middle of the seventeenth century. However, there is no information about when and how their means of production became raised fields and floating gardens on the

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lake itself. Kaul and Zutshi (1966: 273) summarized some early descriptions of how these structures were used, but they did not distinguish clearly between raised fields and floating gardens: According to Sahni (1927) sizable quantities of grasses, reeds and sedges were pressed against the edge and kept in place by means of poles stuck in the mud. In the course of a season or two a natural junction was effected by the newly formed rhizomes and roots. The floating surface thus acquired was then covered over with earth and made fit for cultivation. Contrary to this Rao (1961) argued that the shallow regions of the lake are converted into marshy lands, “demb” thus made fit for cultivation of vegetables. These demb lands are vegetated by willows and poplars and marshy weed, with mud slightly raised above the general water level. Raina (1962) considered that the raw material for floating islands was a mat woven from Typha leaves loaded with clay, whereas Dutt et al. (1964) traced the skeleton of these islands to the reeds of Phragmites communities.

It can be supposed that different methods were developed at a relatively early historical stage for extending the meager agricultural areas along the shore. The first would comprise the straightforward use of the reed zone. Here, after harvesting the foliage (e.g., for fodder), some patches could be used to plant all those vegetables that can grow in a hydroponic milieu. The second would be to cover such patches with waterweeds, mud, and soil. So, over time, compact little islands (ḍēmbs) would be created, raised above the water level, and fixed by planting willow and/or poplar trees whose roots would strengthen the small island’s edges. The third strategy for broadening the economic base was the construction of floating gardens (rāds). It is conceivable that the invention of floating gardens began with the observation that cultivated patches sometimes broke away from the shore due to flooding or a storm. Although they were then floating, the vegetables on them could still be harvested. The next step would then be to cut the roots of reed patches so that they could float freely and be shifted to locations in the open water and used to cultivate cucurbits and other vegetables. The first colonization of these inhospitable and hazard-prone swampy lakeshore and island regions cannot be explained as being due to a general increase in the population and a shortage of fertile land, because, as Hangloo (2008: 93) wrote, “between the sixteenth and the nineteenth centuries there was no substantial increase in population because the number of villages mentioned in the Mughal statistics was the same as in the 1901 census for corresponding districts.”5 However, it can be supposed that before the sixteenth century, the population of Srinagar in particular had grown more quickly, and that increasing urbanization had left very little land for horticultural use. As a result, poor peasants were forced to cultivate the areas around Lake Dal. However, this agricultural use of the lake’s shore areas

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was extremely risky due to the ever-lurking dangers of recurring floods that would destroy the areas under cultivation—as, for instance, in 1642, during the reign of Shah Jahan, when a terrible flood devastated the entire valley, destroying four thousand houses around Dal Lake alone (Mattoo 1988: 51).6 The Jainarājataraṅgiṇῑ (I.5.45), composed in Srinagar between a.d. 1459 and 1472 by Śrῑvara, a disciple of Jonarāja and a close confidant of Zayn al-’Ābidīn, mentions the making of floating gardens and/or raised fields on Dal Lake: “The Sulṭān, [Zayn al-’Ābidīn], conceived the idea of making the earthy surface there [on Dal Lake] a floating field that yields crop. . . . [The surface] had impermeably emerged from rotting grass of all kinds.”7 About one hundred years later, Ạbu’l Fażl Allámi (1891: 2:360–61), who lived in the time of the emperor Akbar (1542–1605), reported in his Ā’ῑn-i Akbarῑ that “Sulṭán Zainu’l Ạbidín (1420–1470) constructed a causeway [sad] of clay and stone one kós in length,” reaching out from the lake’s northeastern shore, next to the famous Mughal Gardens, Shalimar Bagh, and Nishad Bagh,8 to the city (see figure 6.4). He also gave the following description: About the parganah9 of Phák grow a variety of herbs and plants. Adjoining is a large lake called Dal. One side of it is contiguous to the city and on its surface a number of floating islands are constructed which are cultivated, and fraudulent people will at times cut off a piece and carry it away to a different position. (Allámi 1891: 2:360)

Here it can be supposed that he actually did mean floating gardens, because only they, unlike the raised fields—the ḍēmbs—can be moved. These movements and the translocation of floating gardens can also be found in a poem written in Persian by Zafar Khan Ahsan, who was governor of Kashmir in the time of Shah Jahangir (who had succeeded Shah Jahan) and ruled from 1605 to 1627. Ahsan (quoted in Sufi 1948–49: 2:650) wrote, “Land is so scarce here that people steal it in the night.” And, at about the same time, the historian Haidar Mālik Chādūrah, in his Ta’riḫ-i Kashmir from 1617/1622, mentioned “islands” that can be moved: In Pargāna Manchihāmah10 there is an extraordinary spacious lake with many islands. Some islands with green trees and grass (floating fields)11 are stolen by the thieves as this portion of land with trees turns into something like a boat in water. (Cited in Bano 1991, part IV: 99)

A painted map from about the end of the seventeenth century (map. 4.1) provides the first evidence that many islands in Dal Lake were cultivated at that time. On both sides of the causeway, peninsular and/or raised fields were constructed extending into the open water. It was only much later, namely in the first third of the nineteenth century, that floating gardens and their movements are reported again: Abdullah

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Map 4.1. Painted map of Srinagar and the Dal Lake (end of the seventeenth century). Courtesy City Palace Museum, Jaipur. Note: The map shows the cultivated islands in the open water and raised fields attached to the causeway that had already been built in about 1450.

Khan, in his Remembering Srinagar: A Journey of Three Centuries wrote that a police officer had reported the following: People grow vegetables on the Dal Lake. They made small wooden farms looking so beautiful on the lake. Sometimes, theses farms were stolen and the re-

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ports were filed at the police station. We had to go to investigate and find these farms . . . (Quoted in Asad 2010: 124–25)12

From then on, this stealing and carrying away of floating gardens fascinated many writers, and there is hardly a travel book since the middle of the nineteenth century that does not mention them, with such stories still being told to tourists visiting the lake today. To sum up, it seems that already in the eleventh century, some swampy regions in the Kashmir valley were being used for cultivation, and if I understand Al-Biruni rightly, artificially constructed plots that might have been raised fields were being cultivated. There is no precise information about when the islands of Dal Lake were first colonized and when the construction of floating gardens began. It can, however, be assumed that, in the early or mid-fifteenth century, many of the islands were populated and that raised fields were used with certainty in the late sixteenth or early seventeenth centuries. Floating gardens, however, were depicted only at the end of the nineteenth century. Reports that there was a time when no one or only very few people lived on the lake are still in the historical memory of numerous Dal dwellers. Many said that in olden times nobody lived on the lake, and that they believe that the swampy marshes of Dal Lake and the small islands became populated only when Shia families took refuge there to escape persecution and forceful conversion to the Sunni faith.13 The Dal dwellers often said that all Kashmiris were Shiites when they first embraced Islam, and that it was only later that most converted to the Sunni denomination. Despite some confusion about historical names and facts, two informants told me about the persecutions of the Shiites who took refuge on the Dal: When Shah Hamadani came from Iran, people converted to Shia Islam. However, when the Afghans came they were forced to become Sunnites and many were killed and many left their land and took shelter on the lake where up to that time very few people lived. So they started to make rads [floating gardens] and cultivated some zamin [agricultural land]. Now [therefore] the Demb Hanz are Shiites. (Interview with M. S. 17.09.2009) Do you know the old mosque of Shah-i-Hamadan in the city—it is a Shia mosque. When Akbar came he killed many Shia people. Also the Imambara Zadibal [built 1518] near the old city was destroyed eleven times. Shiites ran away from the city to find a safe place in the lake. It is the history of the Mughal Akbar Badshah, who also killed Yousuf Shah Chekh who is also a Shia and who came from Iran. (Interview with S.N 20.07.2017)

From these legendary reports and the historical data (for details, see chapter 2), it can be assumed that the lacustrine economy on the Dal was spurred on when the Shia population suffered extreme persecution in the fifteenth

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and sixteenth centuries, and that many took shelter on the islands and in the swampy regions of the lake. Possibly also later, especially in the time of Afghan rule (1753–1819) when the Shiites were persecuted again, more families fled to the lake area, so that, over time, the Shiites formed the absolute majority of horticulturalists on the lake.14

Floating Islands, Floating Gardens, and Raised Fields: Terminological Confusions Floating Islands Ever since the first travelers praised the beauty of the country and Dal Lake, they have also described the islands and floating gardens. However, it is often not clear what the authors had seen or meant. For some of the artificially made islands in Kashmir, historical sources are clear—for the Wular Lake in the north of the valley, Jonarāja reported from the Sultan: I shall fill this lake with shiploads of rocks by tipping them on top of each other, as if the ocean were to be filled with mountain peaks—as rock transport boats and other constructions made of cedar wood fi xed with proper iron bands are henceforth impermeable to water. ( JRT: 918–19)

And Mῑrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt wrote in his Ta’riḫ-i Rashῑdῑ from 1543: Another wonder of Kashmir is a lake called Wular. . . . In the times of Sultan Zainul’abidin, one of the rulers of Kashmir, a building was constructed. First many stones were thrown into the lake, and on top of them a dais two hundred cubits square and ten cubits high of closely-fitted blocks was made. On top of that square a charming edifice was constructed with extremely fine trees. For strangeness and delightfulness few places in the world can match it. (Mῑrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt 1996: 261)

It is also reported in the Persian chronicle Bahāristān-i Shāhῑ, written in the middle of the seventeenth century, that artificial islands were constructed on both lakes in Kashmir—Wular Lake and Dal Lake. The island in the north of the open water body of Dal Lake (see map 4.3 and figure 4.3) is called Sona Lank (the Golden Island) and also Char Chenar, because it originally had four big plane trees. The other one located in the south of the lake is called Rupa Lank (the Silver Island). It is documented that both were constructed by the Sultan Zayn al-’Ābidī (Khan 1978: 10n74). From early times onward, there was confusion about the different structures on the lake, and “floating island” often became a generic term for all the structures there. Thus, for instance, Van Duzer (2004) referred in his book Floating Islands to Olfert Dapper (1635–89) who gave a description of “floating islands” on the Dal15: “The lake is full of small islands, many of which are pleasure gardens. Because of the fertile and green promenades

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with trees on both sides and the broad-leaved aspen surrounding them, they appear green at all times” (translated). However, this description fails to disclose whether Dapper meant the two islands that the sultan had constructed for his amusement; or, because he said that the lake is “full of small islands,” he meant the many natural islands on which the vegetable gardeners lived and/or their artificially constructed raised fields. The same is true for Jean de Thevenot’s (1633–67/1994) report to which Dapper may have been referring. Jean de Thevenot visited Srinagar in the late 1660s. He wrote that the lake is “adorned with a great many isles that look fresh and green” (p. 82). Moreover, even in the travel literature of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, it is often unclear what exactly the authors observed; and it seems that visitors often had the impression that all the different islands on the Dal were floating. Thus, for instance, Torrens (1962: 274) wrote, “[The two islands Sone Lank and Rupa Lank] seem to float on the water about a mile a-head of us.” Even today Google Maps (2017) marks the island Char Chenar (Sone Lank) as a “floating island.”

Floating Gardens and Raised Fields THE CASE OF THE Chinampas When most nineteenth- and twentieth-century authors wrote about the different structures on the Dal, they called them indistinguishably “floating gardens” and referred to the “floating gardens” of Mexico that Alexander Humboldt (1811: 61–64) mentioned when writing about the chinampas16— gardens that had already existed on Lake Xochimilco and Lake Chalco before the Aztecs entered the valley in the middle of the fourteenth century (Coe 1964: 95). From his description, it is not clear whether Humboldt had seen them or is echoing stories he had heard. As Coe (1964: 90) writes, “In Xochimilco the guides relate the charming story that chinampas are, or once were, ‘floating gardens.’ This is a tall tale that goes back at least to 1590, when Father Acosta included it in his Natural and Moral History of the Indies.” What von Humboldt had possibly seen, Coe assumes, were “rafts of water vegetation that even today are towed to the chinampas and dragged onto them as compost.” In fact, the chinampas were and still are “raised fields,” and “real floating gardens” on which vegetables are grown, as on Dal Lake, may have never existed.

Floating Gardens and Raised Fields on Dal Lake For Dal Lake, Kaul and Zutshi in 1966 already distinguished more or less free-floating, stretches of reeds (rād) on which vegetables are grown from artificial islands into which they could also be converted (ḍēmb). But they

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also used the term “floating islands” for both structures. Until then, the terms “floating island” and “floating garden” were used indiscriminately. For instance, Vass (1980: 13) wrote, “The chief causative factor for [eutrophication] being enrichment due to runoff from floating gardens and habitations,” but it is not clear what the author meant by “floating gardens.” Chemical fertilizers are sometimes used for the agricultural areas on the islands and on the raised fields, and a hazardous runoff is possible; but this is never the case for the rāds, on which chemical fertilizers are never used. Even in recent publications—for instance, that by the Kashmiri geographer Rather (2012)—the raised fields (see his image) are termed “floating gardens.” And Wani et al. (2013: 99), an agrarian economist from the University of Kashmir (SKUAST-K), also spoke about “floating gardens” when obviously describing the construction of raised fields: The Dal Lake has a large number of floating gardens formed by anchoring lumps of weeds with poplar and willow saplings pushed into the lakebed. With constant layers of additional weeds, the floating gardens slowly solidify and in many areas of the lake have been transformed into dry land several feet above the lake surface.

No wonder, then, that even in 2017, the Draft Master Plan: Srinagar Metropolitan Region-2035 stated that the “shrinkage in area [of the Dal] is due to development of hamlets and conversion of water body into floating gardens within the lake” (DMPS 2017: 67). In order to avoid all such misunderstandings, “floating gardens” should be distinguished strictly from “raised fields.” The first term should be reserved for the stretches of reed belts (rāds) that can be used for the cultivation of vegetables.17 These stretches can be detached from the bottom of the lake and then shifted to other localities (images 5.19 and 5.20a–c). In contrast, the unmovable raised fields are artificially made small islands or semi-islands (ḍēmb). Often, the fringe is constructed by old rāds, and the inner space is filled with waterweeds, weeds from the fields, mud, and soil. The rims are then fixed with cuttings from willow or poplar trees. When these fields have reached a certain height above water level, they are used to cultivate different sorts of vegetables (for details, see chapter 5 and images 5.1–5.4).

The Lacustrine Economy in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries The Floating Gardens Mattoo (1988: 43) wrote that during the Mughal period (1580–1750), vegetables were cultivated everywhere in the valley and especially around the

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city of Srinagar. As described in the previous section, it can be supposed that not only the vegetable gardens on the islands but also the raised fields and floating gardens already existed at this time. One of the first descriptions of the different modes of growing vegetables on Dal Lake is given in the Tarikh-i-Kalan (1890/1974: 83–84, quoted in Sharma 1983: 11–12), when addressing Kashmir under Sikh rule (1820–46): In the lakes two types of artificial soil were created by the people living near the lakes. The first type was known as Roah (floating gardens) and the second as Demb, made either along the edge of the lake or in the center of lakes, by raising the ground by putting saplings of trees etc.

In case of the Demb, poplars and willows were planted within a small square, which was later filled up and raised five or six feet above the water level. Sometimes stakes were also used in place of samplings of trees. This kind of soil was very rich and did not require irrigation, but it had serious drawbacks during the time of floods. The Demb was liable to be washed away, but if its height was more than seven feet, it could survive a normal flood. Garden products, such as vegetables and cucumbers, were grown on this soil. Jajira Nauopora (island of Nauopora) was famous for such soil. The area under artificial soil in Dal Lake alone was about 1,890 acres18 in 1899. The floating gardens were made by rafts and reeds on which earth and weeds were placed till it became strong enough to bear sufficient weight. Then the garden was fastened with four stout poles and could be easily removed for the convenience of the owners. Mud and weeds of the lake were used as manure. Excellent vegetables grow on such artificial soil, and as such, these gardens require strict watch at night: Kashmir is probably the only place where land can be stolen. The first Westerner who went on to describe the floating gardens (rād) in great detail was the famous British veterinary surgeon William Moorcroft. He saw them when he visited Dal Lake in the mid-1820s and published his observations in 1832. They differ in certain details from the descriptions published later by Schlagintweit-Sakünlünski (1871), who visited the region between 1854 and 1858, and from those published by Ermens in 1881 (figures 4.1, 4.2, cf. also figure 4.3), but they are similar to the description given by Lawrence in 1895. Here I shall give the full text, because most other authors after him who described the floating gardens on the Dal copied Moorcroft’s descriptions, adding very little new information themselves.19 Moorcroft wrote: The city of Cashmere is situated in the midst of numerous lakes, connected with each other, and insulated plots of ground; in some localities so far raised above the water-line as to be out of danger of submersion on any rise of the water; but the greater portion lying so low as to be subject to be drowned,

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in considerable inundation, which are not uncommon, and, indeed become annually more frequent. . . . These circumstances have suggested an expedient by which certain vegetables are cultivated in safety, and so that they derive as much moisture as may be beneficial to them without being exposed to the risk of being destroyed. This is effected through the medium of floating support, of which the buoyance and flexibility prevent the plants sinking into the mass, or being partially covered with it. Various aquatic plants spring from the bottom of the lake. . . . The lakes are in some parts cut, as it were into avenues separated by beds of sedges and reeds. In these places, then, the farmer establishes his cucumbers and melon-floats, by cutting off the roots of the aquatic plants just mentioned about two feet under the water, so that they completely lose all connection with the bottom of the lake, but retain their former situation in respect to each other. When thus detached from the soil they are pressed into somewhat closer contact, and formed into beds of about two yards’ breadth, and of an indefinite length. The heads of the sedges, reeds, and other plants of the float are cut off and laid upon its surface, and covered with a thin coat of mud, which, at first interrupted in its descent, gradually sink into the mass of matted roots. The bed floats, but is kept in its place by a stake of willow driven through it at each end, which admits of its rising and falling in accommodation to the rise and fall of the water. By means of a long pole thrust among the reeds at the bottom of the lake from the side of a boat, and turned round several times in the same direction, a quantity of confervæ and of other plants are torn off from the bottom and carried in the boat to the platform, where the weeds are twisted into conical mounds about two feet in diameter at their base, and of the same height, terminating at the top in a hollow, which, is filled with fresh soft mud drawn from the bottom of the lake, to which sometimes woodashes are added, though much more frequently omitted. The farmer has in preparation a number of cucumber and melon plants, which have been raised under mats, and of these, when they have four leaves, he places three plants in the basin of every cone or mound, of which a double row runs along the edge of every bed at about two feet distance from each other. No further care is necessary except that of collecting the fruit; and the expense of preparing the platforms and cones is confined to the value of the labour, which altogether is trifling as the work is very soon done. Perhaps a more economical method of raising cucumbers cannot be devised; and though the narrow beds are ordinarily almost in contact by their sides, yet, from their flexible nature, they are so easily separable that a small boat may be readily pushed betwixt the lines without injuring their structure; and, for the most part, they will bear a man’s weight, though generally the fruit is picked off from the boat. I traversed a tract of about fifty acres of these floating gardens in cucumbers and melons, and saw not above half a dozen unhealthy plants; nor have I seen, in the cucumber and melon grounds, in the vicinity of very populous cities in Europe or in Asia, so a large and expanse of plants in a state equally healthy, though, it must be observed, running into somewhat too great luxuriance of growth. . . . On one of my visits to these floating gardens I observed that the stems of many plants had been newly earthed up with a few handfuls of black mud brought from the bottom of the lake. The general depth of the floating beds,

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or mass of reeds and of earth taken together, was about two feet, and some of the beds were about seven feet broad. The general arrangement was a line of cucumber cones bordering each edge and one of the water or musk melon along the middle. The melon plants were peculiarly strong, and their cones were wound round with a fresh addition of confervæ and of other weeds, so as to give to each about five feet in diameter. The season lasts for three month and a half, beginning in June. The fruit is seldom or never pulled in the small or gherkins state, and differs in weight, when of a proper age for the market, from about eight or ten ounces to a pound and quarter, or a pound and a half. . . . Thefts of whole floats are sometimes committed by persons joining in two or three boats to tow them off to distant parts of the lake in the night, and the property thus stolen is difficult to be identified. To prevent this depredation, and also night robbery of the cones, two persons generally sleep in a boat, which is pushed under the shelter of a roof of mats that is permanent during the season. . . . Altogether this variety of farming is highly profitable, and ought to be adopted in Europe as a great resource for raising food for man. (Moorcroft 1832: 258–62)

The later description of the floating gardens on the Dal Lake from Schagintweit-Sakünlünski (1871: 411) differs to a certain extent from Moorcroft’s account because he spoke about “rafts” when he wrote the following: A peculiarity of the lake of Srinagar are the Radhs or “floating gardens.” . . . They are simply big rafts, covered with earth and fixed with stems vertically driven into the ground; the load capacity of the wood is increased by inflated skin-tubes . . . fixed laterally below the water level. Also, these Radhs are not used as beds for flowers and ornamental plants but simply for the cultivation of different vegetables. (Translated from the German original)

Also Ermens (1881: 326),20 who published an article in the French journal La Nature in 1881, gave a detailed description of the construction and maintenance of floating gardens and also characterized them as “rafts”: Nothing is more interesting than this method of cultivation on floating rafts; nothing is more beautiful than the produce obtained by it. Here is how the inhabitants construct these types of floating garden. . . . They start by choosing a suitable place and then place the 7- to 8-m-long poplar poles in two or three rows 4 to 5 meters apart (see A, B, and C in Fig. 1) depending on the length and breadth they desire for their plantations. After completing this procedure, they gather the plants of the lake together with their roots and intertwine them around the poles. These plants form the substrate of the raft as they continue to grow. When this substrate is complete, they gather other plants from the bottom of the lake that they put on the raft. This raises the raft and creates a mound with a height of 60 to 70 cm on a 50 cm base. Deprived of water and exposed to the sun, these plants quickly dry out and rot.

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Figure 4.1. The floating “raft-gardens” of Dal Lake (1881). Source: Ermens 1881: 329.

While building the rafts and the mounds that are positioned about one to two meters apart, depending on which vegetables one wants to cultivate, one starts to sow seeds in a garden next to the settlement on a small island that is part of the lake. . . . Soon the growth of the lower plant layer starts. Now the gardener takes the remains of the plants from the year before and molds little mounds or bird-nest-like shapes by hand, one next to the other, and in these he sows the seeds of pumpkins, melons, watermelons, gourds, tomatoes, eggplants, etc. Every night this sowing is covered with a reed mat. Fourteen to fifteen days after the sowing, these plants are taken away and brought on a raft, prepared in advance, to their final destination. Initially, the young plants are watered, but this work is soon no longer necessary because the roots to the mound do not stop growing and absorbing water. The vegetables are harvested as they grow all summer long with the help of small boats that circulate between the rafts. These vegetables are brought to town and sold on the banks of the river where the people of Srinagar come to purchase them incredibly cheaply. These rafts or floating gardens can last for many years. It is only the rotting of the poles that brings them to an end. Hence, to make them last longer, it is only necessary to renew the poles. (Translated from the French original)

These agglomerations of many rads forming big “gardens” as described and pictured by Ermens are also seen in a drawing from 1875 (figure 4.3). Moorcroft and Schlagintweit-Sakünlünski as well as Ermens gave painstaking but, in some details, different descriptions of how the floating gardens were constructed. Moorcroft and Ermens reported that many of these

The Market Gardeners of Dal Lake

Figure 4.2. The arrangement of floating gardens. Redrawn sketch from Ermens (1881).

Figure 4.3. The floating gardens of the Dal (1866). Courtesy Shaukat Wani, Srinagar, private collection.

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rāds formed large assemblies as seen in figure 4.3 that were sometimes even called “floating farms” (e.g., Naravane 1955: 130), and it seems that they were sometimes still being formed in the middle of the twentieth century. But it can be supposed that until about the middle of the twentieth century, a certain spectrum for the construction of floating gardens was employed depending on the location of the individual market gardener’s home, the ecological situation, and how many hands were available. Therefore next to some “floating farms,” many individual rāds were scattered on the Dal as shown on a so-called map shawl (map 4.2) from about 1875, preserved in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (Harley and Woodward 1992: 433, plate 33). It seems that already at the end of the nineteenth century mainly individual rāds were cultivated (image 4.1), and when Lawrence (1895/1981: 344– 45, 1909: 57–58) gave his description of the rāds and how they are made, he did not mention larger agglomerations of them. Also, image 4.1 shows only individuated strips of floating gardens. The rádh, or floating gardens, are made of long strips of the lake reed, with a breadth of about six feet. These strips can be towed from place to place and are moored at the four corners by poles driven into the lake bed. When the rádh is sufficiently strong to bear the weight of a man, heaps of weed and mud are extracted from the lake by poles, and these heaps are formed into cones and placed at intervals on the rádh. The cones are known as pokar, and each cone

Map 4.2. Detail from a Kashmir map shawl woven in about 1875 showing raised fields and floating gardens. Courtesy Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

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Image 4.1. Floating gardens at the end of the nineteenth century. Courtesy Shaukat Wani, Srinagar, private collection.

accommodates two seedlings of melons or tomatoes, or four seedlings of water-melons or cucumber. Everything that plant life requires is present. A rich soil and ample moisture, with the summer sun of Kashmir, help to produce vegetables in surprising abundance and of excellent quality. It is not an uncommon thing to gather thirty full-size fruits from every plant or from ninety to one hundred fruits from each receptacle (Lawrence 1895/1981: 344-45)

Today, the individual floating gardens as well as the stretches of reeds demarcating the lotus gardens on which cucurbits and other vegetables are planted are still there; however, the big “floating farms” as described in the early literature can no longer be seen.

The Raised Fields It was again Lawrence (1895/1981: 345, 1909: 57–58) who first reported on how the raised fields, the ḍēmbs, are constructed: Not behind the floating gardens in fertility are the demb lands, which are formed along the sides and sometimes in the middle of the lake when the water is shallow. The cultivator selects the site, and plants willows and sometimes poplars along its four sides. Inside these willows he casts boat-loads of weed and mud until this land is above the flood level, and year by year he adds a new dressing of the rich lake weed and mud. Around the demb plot run little

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water-channels from the lake, so that moisture is always present and on the demb a great variety of crops is raised. Rape-seed, maize, tobacco, melons and other cucurbitaceae, potatoes, onions, radish, turnips, egg-plants, white beans, peaches, apricots, and quinces, flourish on this rich soil, and if it were not for the constant liability to forced labour21 and to the curious system under which revenue is collected daily from the half-amphibious dwellers on the Dal lake, the cultivators of the demb lands might have been the most prosperous people in Asia. The demb system is of importance, as it is not confined to the Dal lake, and all over Kashmir the people who live by the great swamps have begun to construct these curious oblong patches.

From maps produced at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century (map 4.3), it is clear that a large part of Dal Lake was

Map 4.3. Combined map adapted from Duke (1910) and Rushbrook (1883/1965). Map by the author.22

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already being used by market gardeners at the beginning or middle of the nineteenth century. Recently, the development and continuous extension of the horticulturally used space of Dal Lake from the fifteenth century until the present was depicted in the Draft Master Plan: Srinagar Metropolitan Region-2035 (DMPS 2017: 3). Here no data were communicated on which the individual maps were based. However, they fit the analysis of the historical data as communicated in this chapter and can thus serve as a historical summary for the evolution of the market gardeners’ economic niche on the Dal. In the next chapter, I shall give a detailed description of the economy of today’s market gardeners together with information on those social structures that relate to their economy, such as inheritance rights and patterns of adoption. The chapter includes the means and modes of production on the islands and raised fields, the construction of floating gardens today, and the harvesting of the lotus rhizomes. It will depict the horticulturalists’ economy and livelihood as part of the “ecosystem Dal.”

Notes 1. Arabic < farsakh; Pers. < parasang (1 farsakh = 5–6 kilometers). 2. Regarding this swamp, Stein (1899: 25) wrote, “Here of course, the Volur lake (Mahāpadma) is meant.”

3. Here it can be supposed that he meant the cultivation of paddy that would, of course, grow on the moist strips of land, but these strips were very small and greatly threatened by floods, thus making cultivation unprofitable. 4. According to Mattoo (1988: 53), Lawrence was referring to Haidar Mālik Chādūrah’s Ta’riḫ-i Kashmir (p. 233) when he observed in 1897 “that almost all the vegetables products that exist in temperate climate can be grown in the valley of Kashmir.” Later, Younghusband (1909/1933: 61), who also visited Dal Lake at the end of the nineteenth century, reported that the shores of the lake were covered with market gardens. Trisal (1987: 44) pointed out that “traditionally the markets of Srinagar have been supplied from the famous floating gardens and irrigated land within the lake area.” Still in the 1950s, as Little (1956: 217) wrote, “outside Srinagar, away from the lake, you find other market gardens, all producing the same vegetables, all being worked diligently and incessantly, so that the city is never short of fresh food.” 5. After a devastating famine in 1831, the population of Kashmir was reduced to onefourth of its former number, and Srinagar had only 40,000 inhabitants (Hügel 1835: 348–49). It is said that in the nineteenth century, the population of Kashmir grew slowly; and that in 1868, the population of the capital Srinagar, according to Lawrence (1895: 225; see also Khan 1978: 32–33n120) was 118,960 persons. For 1891, the number was given as 122,618 (Lawrence 1909: 31), and for 1931, A. Neve (n.d.: 135) estimated 207,000 inhabitants. It seems that Srinagar’s population stayed fairly constant until the middle of the twentieth century, when according to the censuses

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of 1961, 1969, and 1971, it grew to 285,000, 380,000, and 480,328 inhabitants respectively (MPSC 1991: 7–8). According to the 2011 census (CIJK 2011: 89), the population of the city grew by 29.51 percent between 1991 and 2001 and by 23.56 percent between 2001 and 2011. Currently, 1,269,751 individuals are living in Srinagar. Different canals and the Dal Gate (Dal Darwasa) were not constructed until the period of Afghan rule (1753–1819). These helped to regulate the water level of the Jhelum, and, in spring and autumn, especially that of the Dal. But despite all efforts to regulate the rivers and canals, floods were still very frequent in the following two centuries, and some, like those in 1841, 1893, and 1903, caused great devastation. On the big flood in July 1903, Bamzai (1987: 269) wrote, “The bund protecting the Dal or City Lake was also breached near the flood gates, the water rising to ten feet above the high level, and inflicting immense injury to floating gardens, houses, &c. Seven thousand dwellings went down in the neighborhood of the city, including 773 on the Dal lake.” And in 2014, a major flood destroyed nearly all the market gardens on the lake. Walter Slaje, pers. comm. These gardens were built in 1619 by the Mughal emperor Jahangir for his wife Noor Jahan and in 1633 by Asif Khan, the elder brother of Noor Jahan. By the middle of the fourteenth century, a collection of villages came to be called a pargāna, an administrative body, “which was a fiscal as well as a territorial unit, the number of villages in it varying from five or twelve to over six hundred” (Siddiqi 1963–64: 73). Sharma (1983: 7–8) reported that there were traditionally 36 parganas in Kashmir, “though their names and sizes remained changing from time to time.” In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the chaudhurī usually was the hereditary owner (zamīndār) held answerable for the collection of revenue in each pargana (Habib 1982: 57– 58). The pargana Manchihāmah mentioned here was located toward the west of Srinagar (Kaw 2001: 106–7) and comprised eighty-nine villages (Mattoo 1988: 63). For a comprehensive account of The Agrarian System of Mughal India 1556–1700, see Habib (1982, 1999); for the time when Kashmir was under Sikh rule (1820–46), see Sharma (1983: 247–57). “Floating fields” was inserted into the text by the original translator, but we also know that small trees (mainly willows) grew on these floating gardens. I am indebted to Nathalène Reynolds for this information. In the same vein, Alexander Humboldt (1811: 62) postulated that the Aztecs populated the swamps and islands and invented the “floating gardens” known as the chinampas in order to escape from their enemies: “The ingenious inventions of chinampas appear to go back to the end of the 14th century. It has its origin in the extraordinary situation of a people surrounded with enemies, and compelled to live in the midst of a lake little abounding in fish, who were forced to fall upon every means of procuring subsistence.” A possible indication that the colonizing of Dal Lake by market gardeners is relatively recent may be deduced by sifting through the comprehensive collections of hundreds of traditional Kashmiri folk tales (Chaudhury 1975; Dhar, 1986; Knowles 1888). Although there are folktales and fairy tales about the lake, about boat owners

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and fishermen, there is not a single one that mentions vegetable gardeners on islands, raised fields, or floating gardens. Another explanation for the emergence of the Dal dwellers is offered by Bano (1986: 38), who proposed that it happened when the boatpeople from the riverbanks throughout the valley lost their jobs due to the change in the mode of transport. He proposed that they took to agriculture on the lake—a doubtful assumption because, on the one hand, this would be only at the end of the eighteenth century when roads were first constructed and, on the other hand, the boatmen had no agricultural skills. As Lawrence (1895: 279) already stated, this seems to be highly improbable. When he had asked the boatpeople (who, by the way, claimed that they are descended from Noah) whether they would take to agriculture, one of his informants answered, “We shall take to agriculture when the Jhelum dries up.” 15. Dapper was quoting Pierre de Jarric (1566–1617), who described the islands on page 76. But neither he nor de Jarric had ever been to India, and the latter had only compiled the works of the Fathers Luis de Guzmann and Ferdinand Guerreiro, who had mentioned islands on the lake but never claimed that they were floating. Dapper wrote, “Der See ist voll kleiner Inseln / welche so viel Lust=Gärten sind / und wegen ihrer fruchtbaren Bäume / und vergrünten Spaziergänge / so zu beeden Seiten mit Bäumen besetzt sind / und deren umhergesetzten breitblättrichten Aspen allezeit grün scheinen.” 16. Alexander Humboldt (1811: 61–64) wrote, The greater part of these roots is cultivated on the chinampas, called by the Europeans floating gardens. There are two sorts of them, of which the one is movable, and driven about by the wind, and the other fixed and attached to the shore. The first alone merit the domination of floating gardens, but their number is daily diminishing. . . . On the marshy banks of the lakes of Xochimilco and Chalco, the agitated water in the time of great rises carries away pieces of earth covered with herbs, and bound together by roots. These floating about for a long time as they are driven by the wind, sometimes unite into small islands. A tribe of men, too weak to defend themselves on the continent, would take advantage of these portions of ground which accident put within their reach, and which no enemy disputed the property. The oldest chinampas were merely bits of ground joined together artificially, and dug and sown upon by the Aztecs. . . . Simply lumps of earth, carried away from the banks, having given rise to the invention of chinampas; but the industry of the Aztec nation gradually carried this system of cultivation to perfection. The floating gardens, of which very many were found by the Spaniards, and of which many still exist in the lake Chalco, were rafts, formed of reeds (totora) rushes, roots and branches of brushwood [see also, for example, Calnek (1972), Clauzel (2008), Coe (1964), Onofre (1989), and Schilling (1939)]. The only genuine floating islands, however, are those constructed from reeds by the Urus people on Lake Titicaca in Peru/Bolivia (Orlove 1991, 2002). 17. A similar type of floating garden is also found on Lake Inle in Burma (e.g., Bruneau and Bernot 1972; Sidle et al. 2007; Su and Jassby 2000) and in northern Bangladesh (e.g. GIAHS, n.d., Irfanullah et al. 2008; 2011 Islam and Atkins 2007). The term “floating island” is also used (as van Duzer 2008 does) for the floating masses of water

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plants such as water hyacinths, as described by Trivedi et al. (1978) in a location near Jaipur (India). A century-old construction of raised fields, the hortillonnages, also called “Jardins flottants/Floating Gardens,” is well known from Amiens in northwestern France (Canon 1993). Taken from Lawrence (1895 /1981: 20). The original text (note 1) states: “The Dal lake is 3.87 miles in length and 2.58 miles in breadth. It covers an area of 9.9846 square miles. Of this area 1890 acres consist of demb or fixed cultivation, so the total area of the Dal under water and floating gardens is 7.0346 square miles.” See also Moorcroft and Trebeck (1837/1977: 2:137–45), referring mainly to Moorcroft’s (1832: 258–62) original work. See Arora (1933: 39); Bellew (1875: 66–67); Bruce (1911: 72); Denys (1915: 79); Doughty (1901: 136–37); Drew (1875/1976: 186); Duke (1920: 27–29); Gervis (1954: 91); Honigberger (1852: 184); Hügel (1845: 113); Khan (1978: 77n279); Lambert (1877: 146); Lawrence (1895: 344–45); Murray Aynsley (1879: 75); Norris (1989: 52); Rubrook (1883/1965: 518); Sufi (1949: 2:651); Tempel (1887: 54); Vigne (1880/1981: 2:90–91); von Hügel (1845: 113); Wakefield 1897: 156), Younghusband (1909/1933: 61). Directeur des traveaux agricoles et viticoles de S.M. le Maharajah de Kashmyre et de Jammu, à Srinagar. As Sir Walter Roper Lawrence (1929: 133–34), who was the settlement commissioner for Jammu and Kashmir between 1889 and 1894 reported, “The wicked system of forced labour had ruined the country, and as I settled in each division of the valley the revenue that the villagers were to pay, in cash, and not as heretofore in kind, not to middlemen pandits, but to the State, I set free the villagers from the crushing exaction which were enforced by the privilege classes under the tyrannous system known as Bégar.” (For details, see Kaw 1990). The area marked here as “Floating Gardens” and “Pokar” is often also labeled dudar pokar in other maps (e.g., J. Murray 1911: 428). The term dudar may be a corruption of the Kashmiri term dādar or dādur signifying a “kitchen gardener” (Grierson and Shastri 1916: 192). Thus, the entry dudar pokar may signify the area of the kitchen gardeners’ pokars.

5  The Market Gardeners’ Economy Today The Lake Dwellers and Their Settlements The first description of the islands in Dal Lake and the livelihoods of the people inhabiting them was not made until the middle of the nineteenth century. It came from Frederic Drew (1875/1976: 166), who stayed in Jammu and Kashmir between 1862 and 1872. He wrote: “Small villages are seen on little pieces of ground slightly above the level of the marsh, whose inhabitants get their living as much from the water as from the land around.” It has already been mentioned that the nonlake dwellers refer to all people living on Dal and Nageen Lakes as “Hanz,” whereas only a fraction of those who live on the islands and peninsulas are called and often also call themselves “Demb Hanz.” Many of these are market gardeners who reside mainly in the western and southwestern parts of Dal Lake (see map 5.1). By associating themselves with the arable land or soil (metsü, zamin*), the market gardeners on Dal Lake prefer nowadays to call themselves zamindārs*, using the Persian/Urdu term for a keeper or holder of land who has a degree of control or attachment to this land but not necessarily ownership (Habib 1982: 244). As similar subdivisions are in the city, these lake settlements are divided into administrative units (mohallahs*). Unless the number of hamlets on an island or a peninsula is large, a mohallah generally consists of more than one island or peninsula. It is usually named after the oldest, biggest, and/or most influential family, as can be seen from map 5.1. This shows the distribution

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Map 5.1. Distribution of the most important mohallahs on the Dal Lake. Map by the author. Own enquiry and DPR 2000. Note: Market gardeners from many of these mohallahs, and especially from the Dole Demb area (mohallahs 42–45), have now been rehabilitated.

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of the fifty-one most important mohallahs on the lake out of the ninety-six listed in table 9.8 of the DPR (2000: 245–47).1 The following will describe in detail the different means and modes of production applied by the market gardeners today.

The Means and Modes of Production Mattoo (1988: 43) writes that during the time of the Moghals (1580–1750), vegetables were cultivated everywhere in the valley and especially around the city of Srinagar. There are four possible locations in which lake gardeners cultivate or raise vegetables: 1. 2. 3. 4.

On the small natural islands, often enlarged artificially over time. On the raised fields they have constructed. On more or less free-floating gardens. In the lotus gardens. Here, they harvest the lotus rhizomes growing in the individually owned lotus gardens, and, in addition, they harvest natural resources from the lake such as water nuts, animal feed, and reeds for weaving mats.

The plots for growing vegetables on Dal Lake are all arranged spatially in the same way: the raised fields radiate out from the hamlets or from semiislands with some agricultural land. These are followed by lotus gardens, more or less encircled by belts of reeds that reach out into the open water (figure 5.1). The following paragraphs will describe the different means and modes of construction, along with the maintenance of the raised fields, floating gardens, and lotus fields.

The Construction of Raised Fields and Their Cultivation There are two different types of raised field or ḍēmb. One is constructed in the shallow water adjacent to an island, separated from it by only a small canal. Over time, these canals often fill up with silt, and the raised fields become part of the island. The other type is an expanse some distance or even further away from the island in open water (images 5.1 and 5.2). In both cases, the first stage in constructing a ḍēmb is to encircle a certain round or elongated space with a rampart made from old floating gardens (image 5.3) and/or water lilies and especially their roots together with masses of waterweeds and mud. Then the pond-like inner space is filled with soil, waterweeds, mud, and all sorts of organic waste.

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Figure 5.1. A section from the Landsat scene, showing houses, gardens and raised fields. Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06.

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Around the acreage, rods, mainly from willow (vῑr) and poplar trees (phras), are then rammed through the wall into the lake’s floor. These rods quickly sprout new leaves, and their roots stanchion the circular rampart. Depending on the amount of waste, mud, earth, etc., used to fill the inner acreage, the ḍēmb will slowly fill up until it reaches a height of about one-

Image 5.1. A small two-year-old raised field in spring. Photo by the author.

Image 5.2. A roughly three-year-old raised field ready to be cultivated. Photo by the author.

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half meter above the lake’s surface. After about one or two years, the newly created land can be used to grow vegetables. Many of these raised fields are about twenty years old, as can be seen from the circumference of the trees encircling them (image 5.4). Over time, such

Image 5.3. Old floating gardens used to encircle an area to make a raised field. Photo by the author.

Image 5.4. A roughly twenty-year-old raised field with the new growth of winter vegetables. Photo by the author.

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raised fields lying next to each other may often merge together to form one new big island (see the framed area in figures 6.4, 6.5, 6.6a, and 6.6b). The different parts of this island are then owned and tilled separately by those who formerly had owned the different ḍēmbs that have merged. In dry periods, both the raised fields and the vegetable gardens on the islands are traditionally irrigated with the help of a big iron pot (sāgenūt)2 on a tōl, a lifting lever that can be swiveled (images 5.5ab) so that water can be

Images 5.5a, b. A lifting lever and the big iron pot traditionally used for irrigation. Photos by the author.

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fetched from the canals and poured out onto the fields. Nowadays, gardeners increasingly use diesel pumps that can be hired from rich zamindars.

Dendrochronology and the Age of Raised Fields As reported above, whenever ḍēmbs are constructed, cuttings from fast-growing willows and poplars are inserted into the field’s edge so that the quickly developing roots will fortify the construction. Thus, the age of the trees encompassing a raised field can give some indication of that field’s age. Observations have shown that the trunks of most such trees bordering the fields have a radius between nine and twelve centimeters. A dendrochronological analysis3 of the annual rings of a willow and a poplar tree felled in 2017 with radii of twelve and nine centimeters respectively indicates an age between thirteen and sixteen years. It can be assumed that many of the ḍēmbs on Dal Lake are not much older. This also fits in well with the fact that the construction of raised fields was strictly forbidden for many years, so that as figures 5.2ab show, there were fewer raised fields in the 1960s compared to the same site in 2011. Construction also came to a definite halt during the severe unrests in the 1970s and 1980s, and it was only in the late 1990s that raised fields began to be constructed again in any numbers. Stems of both species with a radius of twenty to twenty-five centimeters are found rarely, mainly occurring where some or many raised fields have merged together and formed one large island as shown in the framed area in chapter 6 (figures 6.4, 6.6a, b). Such trees are roughly thirteen to sixteen years old. However, because of the high supply of nutrients in their hydroponic environment, they may also be as old as twenty years. Nonetheless, this does not mean that none of these fields is older, because new saplings are often planted, and whenever a tree has grown quite high, it is common practice to fell it and sell it for lumber. In summary, it can be stated only that most of the raised fields seen on the lake today are not very old, and that very old ones are often no longer recognizable because they have become part of a larger agricultural unit.

On Waterweeds and Manure The macrophytes of the lake, especially species belonging to the Ceratophyllum–Myriophyllum complex and water lilies, fulfil an important ecological and economic role. On the one hand, they absorb and fix nutrients from the lake’s sediment, thereby reducing the pollution through being removed by either market gardeners or de-weeding machines; they oxygenate the lake water;4 and they provide both breeding places and shelter to different spe-

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cies of fish. On the other hand, for horticulturalists, these waterweeds (hil) form the basis for their traditional agricultural activities, and it is no exaggeration to say that the important production of vegetables for Srinagar city would not be possible without them.5 Mainly two rooted floating species— the hornwort Ceratophyllum demersum (shāz) and the Eurasian watermilfoil Myriophyllum spicatum6 (khon)—along with some pondweeds such as Potamogeton crispus P. lucens (shrāṭh) and Elodea (sīl) are harvested for this purpose. Harvesting is conducted twice a year: once, between the months of March and May before the summer vegetables are sown or planted out, and again at the end of summer in late August and September before the fields are prepared for winter vegetables and when the biomass of Ceratophyllum and Myriophyllum is at its maximum. The weeds together with the silt adhering to them are used to fertilize all the agrarian sites on both islands and raised fields. Sometimes they are scattered directly over the acreage, but mainly they are gathered to produce compost that is used as manure (pāh). Waterweeds are harvested by either the owner of the fields and/or some of his male family members or by employed workers (masdur*). They are harvested with the help of long, slightly bent poles (wilin) that are turned and twisted until the masses of plants wind around the poles like spaghetti on a fork before being lifted into a boat (image 5.6). The masses of aquatic plants (mainly Ceratophyllum demersum) together with some of the mud adhering to them are loaded onto

Image 5.6. Harvesting the hil (Ceratophyllum demersum). Photo by the author.

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either small skiffs (ḍēmb nāv)7 (image 5.7) or large boats (kōtsh). If harvested by nonfamily members, a landowner will pay three to four hundred rupees for a small skiff load and one thousand to fifteen hundred rupees for a large boatload. The plants are then brought to the fields (image 5.7) where they are piled up in big heaps (image 5.8).

Image 5.7. Bringing the hil to the fields. Photo by the author.

Image 5.8. Waterweeds piled up to make compost. Photo by the author.

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After about half a year, the weeds will have rotted down into compost. They are then spread out as manure on the islands and raised fields by loosening the soil (mits, zamin*) with a big hoe (khon) and/or a smaller one (ṭōngur), and then using the same tools to work the compost into the soil (image 5.9). The mud/silt (rab)8 of Dal Lake is also used. Depending on the time of the year, this makes up between 32 and 54 percent of the lake’s sediment (Pandit 1999: 78–79, tables 22–23; Trisal and Kaul 1983) and has a high content of nutrients (especially phosphate and nitrate). It is dredged from the lake’s bottom with a special net (khashü) (images 5.10) and spread over the fields or around the young plants on the floating gardens. The following paragraphs will describe the nutrient cycle of the lake in some detail in order to show how the chemophysical properties of water and mud/silt relate to the growth of the waterweeds from which the compost that serves as the basis for the market gardeners’ horticultural economy is produced.

Image 5.9. Working the compost into the soil. Photo by the author.

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Image 5.10. Nets (khashū) to lift mud and water plants from the lake’s bottom. Photo by the author.

The Nutrient Cycle The Chemophysical Water Properties of Dal and Nageen Lakes Dal Lake can be characterized as a eutrophic temperate marl lake with high amounts of dissolved calcium carbonate. Its high levels of phosphates and nitrogen are responsible for the vast biomass of macrophytes that are important for the economy of the market gardeners, such as the reeds Typha angustata and Phragmited communis; submerged macrophytes such as Ceratophyllum demersum, Myriophyllum spicatum, and Elodea canadensis; and two species of Potamogeton (for a comprehensive list of Dal Lake hydrophytes, see Pandit 1999: 82–85). Furthermore, three floating species—a duckweed (Lemnoideae), the floating ferns (Salvinia natans), and, since some decades, also Azolla cristata (both called mongol)—are seen everywhere.9 Unlike the rooted species, these floating ones absorb nutrients from the water. The high mineral load of the Dal is due mainly to the intensive weathering of the mountainous catchment area rich in volcanic rocks that contain carbonates, silicates, and phosphate minerals (apatite). This is where the Telbal Nala mountain stream arises, which enters Dal Lake from the north. Table 5.1 reports the concentration of the different minerals in water samples taken from the Telbal Nala and at different locations in Dal and Nageen

[mg/L]

[mg/L]

[mg/L]

[mg/L]

[mg/L]

[mg/L]

[mg/L]

[mg/L]

[-]

Phosphate

Sulfate

Na

K

Mg

Ca

Mn

Fe

pH

184.7

7.19

0

0

26.06

6.34

1.12

3.8

12.26

0.17

n.a.

n.a.

192

7.1

0

0

29.57

6.54

1.09

3.86

11.96

n.a.

n.a.

n.a.

4.17

n.a.

182.4

7.14

0

0

28.64

6.31

0.89

3.98

11.88

n.a.

n.a.

n.a.

4.03

n.a.

203

7.26

0

0

27.6

6.12

1.12

3.76

10.12

5.73

4.73

n.a.

4.92

0,07

186.1

7.29

0

0

27.76

5.9

1.14

3.39

10.75

n.a.

n.a.

n.a.

3.44

n.a.

Central Nageen

275

7.47

0

0

50.06

6.48

0.92

2.98

11.99

4.18

4.18

n.a.

3.6

0.13

228

7.49

0

0

36.83

5.71

0.97

2.75

11.85

4.9

4.9

n.a.

3.09

n.a.

Dal Lake Telbal Nala near the about 1 km mouth of from the the Telbal Nala mouth

161.7

7.43

0

0

26.35

3.77

1.22

3.82

4.66

n.a.

n.a.

n.a.

4.04

n.a.

Central Dal

199.2

7.63

0

0

32.59

3.72

1.61

4.22

6.25

n.a.

n.a.

n.a.

4.52

n.a.

187.3

7.11

0

0

31.58

4.05

1.05

4.02

5.21

1.62

7.63

n.a.

4.25

0.09

Central Dal next to Kabutar Khana Dal Gate

Sample 5 Sample 6a Sample 6b Sample 7a Sample 7b Sample 8

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Table by the author. Note: The shaded figures mark locations with particularly high concentrations (n.a. = not analyzed).

µS cm

[mg/L]

Nitrate

Conductivity

[mg/L]

Nitrite

-1

[mg/L]

Chloride

4.7

n.a.

[mg/L]

Fluoride

Western Nageen

Sample 4

Next to raised Western Nageen fields and (in a lotus settlements (Dal) garden)

Sample 1 Sample 2 Sample 3

Amir Kadal

Unit

Locality

Probe

Table: 5.1. Concentration of some nutrients, conductivity, and pH values in water samples.

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Lakes. The data presented here must be understood only as a snapshot in time, because of the ceaseless seasonal and annual climate variations as well as the fluctuating anthropogenic influences that will be discussed in more detail in chapter 9. Basically, however, the data are in the same range as previously published results (see Jeelani and Shah 2006; Trisal 1987: table 1; Zutshi and Khan 1988; Zutshi et al. 1980: 104) reporting pH values between six and seven and showing the order of cations as Ca2+ > Mg2+ > N2+ > K+. Here it is important to note that the data mirror the strong impact of anthropogenic influences. This is obvious when the data on the concentrations of especially nitrate, phosphate, and calcium (shaded figures) are compared to those obtained from regions farther away from human impact. The higher rates of conductivity for calcium (Ca), phosphate (PO4), and nitrate (NO3) can be explained by (a) the high influx of water from the mineral-rich and often overfertilized agricultural catchment area of the Telbal Nala, (b) the influx from the vegetable gardens that sometimes use chemical fertilizers that then drain off into the water, and (c) the sewage reaching the lake from the crowded tourist areas near Kabutar Khana (pigeon loft) and the high concentration of houseboats near the Dal Gate where the outflow of the lake toward Jhelum River is regulated.

On Macrophyte Biomass, Compost, and Manure Wanganeo (2008) reported average figures of 3.2 kg/m2 fresh weight for the extremely high amount of macrophyte biomass of Dal Lake. Several authors have calculated the lake’s annual productivity. Whereas Kaul (1977) gave a figure of 30.7 t/ha for the years 1970–72, Zutshi and Vass (1982; see also Handoo and Kaul 1998) estimated 41 t/ha for 1972–76, and Trisal (1987) calculated the total macrophyte biomass for the entire lake at 4,735 tons. His data referred to the dominant species, including 27.6 t/ha of helophytes, 8.8 t/ha of floating forms, and 4.6 t/ha of submerged species.

The Nutrient Content in Some Waterweeds and in Compost Next to the minerals potassium (K) and calcium (Ca), it is nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) that are of crucial importance for the market gardeners’ vegetables. Traditionally and even today, these are still obtained mainly from the manure produced by composting. Here, the waterweed hornwort (Ceratophyllum demersum) is of special interest, because it is almost the exclusive source of compost (see images 5.6–5.9). An analysis of five different samples of this species taken in July 2017 from different locations of Dal and Nageen Lakes shows N values lying between 25.4 and 31.01 g/kg/dry matter and

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PO4 values between 4.33 and 7.99 g/kg/dry matter.10 The amount of these nutrients locked in a plant’s tissue determines the quality of the compost and thus the resulting manure. When the total N of a plant tissue lies between 1.5 and 2.0 percent or higher, no extra nitrogen is needed to ensure proper decomposition. Furthermore, an analysis of the important minerals in this plant reveals values of 7.50 g/kg/dry matter for K, 1.60 g/kg/dry matter for Ca, and 42.33 g/kg/dry matter for magnesium (Mg). These values are all high enough to guarantee the production of good manure. As Handoo and Kaul already reported in 1998, Harvesting and boat carriage of submerged vegetation comprised of predominant Myriophyllum spicatum and Ceratophyllum demersum for use as green manure is a common sight in Kashmir. Such a simplest and least costly use of water plants for the purpose [to produce compost] is in consonance with the high tissue level of N, P, and K recorded for life forms. . . . Also, no extra nitrogen is needed for composting as the macrophytes contain sufficient total N (1.96–3.02%) for decomposition although such a requirement is needed for dry biomass containing less than 1.5% N (Reimer and Toth 1969). Nor will these compost need the addition of extra K and P, though the partial drying of the harvested biomass is necessary to reduce anaerobic decomposition to a minimum. (Handoo and Kaul 1998: 218)

The bulk of these weeds is piled up and left to rot for six months to one year. When the weeds have dried and turned into compost, they are brought to the agrarian sites and mixed with the soil. An analysis of a mix of three samples of compost taken from different sites in 2013 gives the following average results (table 5.2): Table 5.2. pH value and concentrations of some minerals in a mixed sample of compost. Table by the author. *Values of nutrients available to plants. pH

K*

Ca

Mg*

Mn

PO4

Fe

C

N

6.77

0.95

?

0.19

0.60

0.07

20.30

102.95

9.42

The analysis shows that at 6.77, the pH value is optimal for the solubility of K and PO4. The same holds true for Mg that, with 0.19 g/kg/dry matter, is positioned in the optimal range reported in the literature of 150–300 mg/ kg/dry matter. The value of 12.80, calculated as the relation of C to N, lies in the optimal range for good agricultural land that is usually given as being between 10.0 and 15.0. The differences between the higher values for K and Mg in the plant Ceratophyllum compared (see table 5.1) to the lower ones in the compost are due mainly to rain washing away many minerals. Here, it can also be mentioned that the mud/silt adhering to the water plants that is also lifted deliberately from the lake’s bottom and used as fertilizer contains, as the analysis of a mix of five samples taken in July 2017 shows, an average

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of 0.36 g/kg/dry matter of P04 and the high value of 25.8 mg/kg/dry matter of N. A certain amount of nutrients, especially P and N, which are the main cause of the eutrophication of Dal Lake, have always been removed traditionally from the lake by the market gardeners when harvesting the water plants. However, in the last ten years or so, the use of waterweeds to produce compost has declined, and a greater amount of chemical fertilizer is being used. This combined with an increasing influx of sewage from the growing city is leading to an increasing deterioration of the lake. For some decades now, the Lake and Waterways Development Authorities (LAWDA) have started to remove water plants by dredging. However, as Vass (1980) remarked and as will be described in detail in chapter 9, Substantial quantities of nutrients are tied up in the plant material in the Dal. Therefore consideration was given to dredging, in an effort to remove this concentrated source of nutrients. However, until now by dredging the plants are not uprooted but only cut off some meters below the lake’s surface. This leads to the effect that plants build even more biomass by sprouting many more new shoots to reach the bright surface.

The Construction of Floating Gardens The most remarkable mode of production, however, concerns the construction of the floating vegetable gardens on the rāds that are used mainly to grow different sorts of cucurbits. As reported in the previous chapter, many travelers have written about them both in colonial times and later in the twentieth century.11 The term rād (literally: a line, a row) refers here to both the stretches of reeds that often border the territory of an owner’s lotus garden and, more specifically, such stretches used to cultivate vegetables. Before about 1950, these floating gardens, it is said, were not very compact, and it was barely possible to walk on them. However, as old people on the Dal told me, a change came after the yellow strain of water lily was introduced by Kashmir’s last Maharaja Hari Singh (1895–1961) in about 1940. This spread quickly over many parts of the lake, and market gardeners began to use its more compact root system with its high buoyancy to build floating gardens that can bear a person’s weight. Nowadays, when constructing a new floating garden, masses of lily roots are detached from the lake’s bottom with the help of a special hooked rod (chomb) and then arranged along the borders of a lotus field or mounted on an already existing reed belt (images 5.11 and 5.12). These stretches are then also covered with mud from the lake bottom, and, within a short time, different grasses and other plants grow on them.

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Image 5.11. A newly fabricated floating garden (2017). Photo by the author.

Image 5.12. One of the floating gardens in summer 2018. Photo courtesy Sulfkar Nagoo.

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Usually, cucurbits can be planted by the next spring after using a sickle (drōt) to cut short the now high-standing grass for animal feed. Some weeks beforehand, the market gardeners will already have started to germinate different cucurbits in small conical containers (tulche). These are formed with waterweeds, preferentially with the long flexible twigs of Myriophyllum12 mixed with mud in such a way that a container is formed with a central depression in which three to four seeds (byōl) can be positioned (image 5.13). These cones are then covered with reed mats (today, often with plastic sheets) until the young plants have germinated and reached a height of about fifteen centimeters. All this work is normally done between the end of March and the first weeks of April. The vegetables planted in the tulche are different sorts of cucurbits, mainly calabash gourds (Lagenaria sicerania var asiatica), striped and bitter gourds (Luffa acutangula and Momordica charantia), pumpkins (Cucurbita pepo), and cucumbers (Cucumis sativus). Some other vegetables such as tomatoes, eggplants, and sweet peppers are also germinated and later cultivated on the rād in this way. During this time, gardeners also form bigger cones called pōkur that are positioned about forty to fifty centimeters from each other on the rāds (image 5.14) or are brought to the more or less moist soil in the riparian zone at the edge of the islands or raised fields. When the young plants in the tulche have reached a certain height, they are transported by boat to a floating garden, raised field, or the moist bank of the island. There the tulche with the

Image 5.13. Molding tulche out of waterweeds mixed with mud. Photo by the author.

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Image 5.14. Making pōkurs on a rād. Photo by the author.

young plants are inserted into the pōkurs where they grow quickly (image 5.15). Those positioned in the littoral or riparian zone are covered with more wet water plants and mud (image 5.16) to prevent dehydration before their roots penetrate the pōkur and reach the moist soil.

Image 5.15. Young gourds growing out of pōkurs. Photo by the author.

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Image 5.16. Inserting the tulche with the young plants into the pōkurs in the littoral zone. Photo by the author.

The next step is to provide the plants with stakes to climb up (image 5.17). Later, thinner stakes are tied together to form a close-meshed lattice to which the climbers can cling (image 5.18). In late summer, after all the cucurbits have been harvested and the plants have died, these stakes are re-collected for use in the following year.

Image 5.17. Stakes inserted into the rād to support climbers. Photo by the author.

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Image 5.18. Stakes tied together to form a lattice on which climbers can cling. Photo by the author.

Often whole rāds, or parts of them, encircling a gardener’s lotus field are cut out, transported, and moored in another part of a gardener’s territory. To do this, the gardeners cut off the roots of the reeds that have reached the bottom of the lake with a paddle-like tool (liwan) framed with a slightly bent sharp iron edge (image 5.19). Now the rād is free floating and can be moved.

Image 5.19. Detaching the rād from the lake’s bottom with a liwan. Photo by the author.

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With the help of long poles, it is then pushed and punted to its new destination (images 5.20a–c). This might be only a hundred meters or so, but it is rarely moved more than half a kilometer from its old location. When the new destination is reached, it is moored with long poles at both ends and in the middle to prevent it from drifting away (image 5.21) due to wind or flooding. Often such stretches can form a small garden with up to ten rāds lying next to each so that only the owners’ small boats can pass. Because many different rāds often lie in the same area, individual ownership is marked by hanging pieces of colored cloth or an old shoe or slipper on one of the poles (see image 5.27). It is reported that, in the past, when a man died, his movable garden had “to be divided among his inheritors, they cut it up and each goes off with a part of the floating garden, complete with the vegetables upon it” (Little 1956: 212). Nowadays, if the land of the deceased has to be distributed among his inheritors, rāds are no longer a part of the inheritance because they are available everywhere (e.g., surrounding all lotus gardens). Over roughly the last five decades, the number of free-floating gardens lying next to each other has declined drastically in many areas in favor of more open water for lotus gardens. This is shown by the images taken in 1965 and 2011. During this period, the number of raised fields constructed next to the island increased, and the number of rāds (on which vegetables are still grown in part) declined (figures 5.2ab).

Images 5.20a–c. Moving the floating rād to a new location. Photos by the author.

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Image 5.21. Mooring the rād at its new location. Photo by the author.

Figures 5.2a, b. A cluster of hamlets with adjacent raised fields and lotus gardens 1965 and 2011. Source: The KH-7 surveillance system July 1963 to June 1967 and Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. Note: In 1965, some hundred rāds for growing vegetables were arranged neatly next to each other east of the hamlet. In 2011, the number of raised fields had multiplied, leaving mainly only those rāds that demarcate the individually owned lotus gardens. (Sources: The KH-7 surveillance system July 1963 to June 1967 and Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06.)

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The Lotus Gardens The lotus gardens are the third and, for some market gardeners, the most important source of income. Although sold very rarely, they can fetch prices of sixty to ninety thousand rupees per kanal. They consist of smaller or larger stretches of open water, mainly rectangular in shape and demarcated with bands of reeds (nār),13 and it is said that one kanal of lotus gardens can produce a harvest of rhizomes worth fifty to sixty thousand rupees per year. The gardens normally require very little maintenance. Gardeners only have to remove the waterweeds every second or third year. The lotus plants (pampōsh) overwinter in the silt at the bottom of the lake (image 5.22) and start to sprout in late April, with the leaves appearing in June (image 5.23) followed by the flowers in July and August. In September, the rhizomes (nadru14) develop and can be harvested. Already in 1881, Ermens wrote, The amount of vegetables produced by the lake of Srinagar is incredible; alongside the direct products of cultivation, there is an abundance of others that grow naturally, such as the roots of the lotus that look very much like a large kind of asparagus, but without its taste or flavor. However, the seeds of the lotus are excellent and recall fresh nuts. (Ermens 1881: 330, translation)

The rhizomes of the lotus are harvested from the end of September until the end of the winter. They are an important autumn and winter food.15

Image 5.22. A lotus garden demarcated by rāds in early spring before the lotus plants emerge. Photo by the author.

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Image 5.23. The same garden in summer covered with lotus plants. Photo by the author.

They are pulled out with the help of a nadir chomb, a rod (chomb) to which a special hook (kow) has been attached that is manufactured by the blacksmith (sheshtawor), who also makes the iron pots (sāgenōṭ) used to irrigate the fields. The hook is positioned under the newly grown rhizomes and pulled up to the surface (images 5.24 and 5.25). Greengrocers sell the nadru in bundles (gīd) containing eight to ten rhizomes (depending on their diameter) for two to three hundred rupees. In the city, they are also sold at the roadside. These sellers are often poor gardeners or their family members, who stand to earn more through directly marketing their wares than they would at the floating market, where they would only receive two-thirds the price. The nadru they sell have been harvested in the common areas of the lake and are often sold together with the lotus pods (image 5.26) containing the tasty kernels (pamtche gōg ji). The lotus flowers are offered to tourists, mainly by children. For some years now, the government has been engaging in rehabilitation measures to counteract the increasing growth of settlements on Dal Lake, which is thought to be the reason for the extreme eutrophication of the water. The government has been buying lotus fields from their owners if

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Image 5.24. Pulling up the lotus rhizomes with a nadir chomb. Photo by the author.

Image 5.25. The special hook attached to a rod (chomb) for pulling up lotus rhizomes. Photo by the author.

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Image 5.26. Selling lotus pods and gourds at the roadside. Photo by the author.

the family will agree to be resettled, for example, in Rakh-i-Arath, which is approximately fourteen kilometers away from Srinagar. It is said that the government pays 1.4 lakh per kanal (for details, see chapter 10).

Uncertainty, Risks, and Preparedness Uncertainty, Risks, and the Changing Water Level One of the factors on which the successful production of vegetables depends on the islands and especially on the raised fields is the seasonal variation in the lake’s water level. The Telbal Nala, a mountain stream originating in the catchment area in the Datchigam region north of the Dal, provides, on average, 61.6 percent of the total influx to the lake (DPR 2000). The interannual variations in the stream’s discharge in the years 1985–98, as shown in figure 5.4, are due to the variation of precipitation in the valley and especially in the catchment area of the stream (DPR 2000). Data collected over the years 1986–99 show an average influx of 102.37 million cubic meters with a standard deviation of 35.49 million cubic meters. The highest influx was in 1995 at 173.2 million cubic meters, and the lowest was in 1999 at only 51.41 million cubic meters.

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Figure 5.3. Annual variation of influx to the Dal 1985 to 1998. Graph by the author calculated from DPR 2000: table 2.13.

In years with very high influx rates, low parts of the arable land on the islands, but mainly the raised fields and the plots where cucurbits are cultivated in the ḍēmb zone of the islands, are flooded. If the high water level remains for some time before finally draining off through the Dal Gate (Dal Darwasa) and the Amir Kadal Nala outlet, many vegetables will be lost. This happened, for instance, after the big flood in September 2014, when the agricultural acreage was engulfed to such an extent that the market gardeners could only begin to grow vegetables again in the following summer because most arable areas were still submerged in spring. Whereas the amount of rain falling in a given year is unpredictable, the months in which a dangerous flush can happen are predictable, because the monthly rainfall pattern in Srinagar, which can stand for the whole valley, follows a distinct pattern (figure 5.4) and is equivalent to the average monthly discharge of the Telbal Nala into Dal Lake (figure 5.5).

Preparedness and the Floating Garden Strategy Sometimes, due to an extreme influx of water from the catchment area and heavy rains in the valley, the water level of the lake rises to such a level that a complete loss of field crops occurs. However, the market gardeners are prepared for this.16 They know that an extreme flush is possible every year between the end of February and mid-April. One way to reduce the danger

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Figure 5.4. Monthly precipitation averages for Srinagar (1973–2009). Figure by the author.

Figure 5.5. Monthly average discharge from the Telbal Nala into the Dal (1985– 1998). Graph by the author, calculated from DPR 2000: table 2.14.

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of a complete crop failure is to use floating gardens. As Ermens (1881: 32) already observed at the end of the nineteen century, If the water rises, the floating garden follows the upward movement; likewise it sinks in line with the movement of the water without the plants going through any change or interruption to their growth. When you reach the middle of these floating plantations in the evening, you could imagine that you are in a port on the coast surrounded by boats moving up and down with the tide. (Ermens 1881: 330, translation)

Thus, in times of flood, the gardeners can harvest enough vegetables from the floating gardens, which rise and fall with the water level, to avoid extreme impoverishment. After having withstood such a lean period, they can usually cultivate the agricultural land again when the next cycle begins in the spring of the subsequent year. This, for instance, was observed in May 2010 when the water level rose more than a meter. Many of the fields on the islands and most raised fields were flooded, ruining the young plants. But as image 5.27 shows, the floating gardens sank only a few centimeters, so the pōkurs with the young plants survived. The same was observed after the devastating flood of September 2014, when next to the loss of life and the damage to many houses (leaving a great number of families homeless), most of the vegetables on the islands and raised fields were lost. However, nearly all the cucurbits on the floating gardens survived. The great loss of other vegetables led to drastic price rises, so that the Consumer and Affairs and Public Distribution Department (CAPD) encouraged growers to sell their produce directly to end customers at some special sale points in the city and circumvent the chain of middlemen (GK 23.02.2015).17 Another effect was a strong return to the centuries-old Kashmiri tradition of drying certain vegetables (hokh syun)18 in summer and autumn to sell in winter (image 5.28), a tradition that had Image 5.27. Partly submerged free-floating never died out but declined in re- rād during a high water level in May 2010. cent decades. Photo by the author.

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Image 5.28. Sliced bottle gourds hung up to dry. Photo by the author.

Safeguarding the Lacustrine Economy: Exploiting Natural Resources Animal Feed Of course, horticulture is the main source of income for the market gardeners, but many of them also have one or two cows, some sheep, and fowl such as chickens or even some ducks or geese. Especially for the ungulates, the lake also provides the means of keeping them. First of all, the reeds Phragmites australis and Typhy angustifolia and some other emergent plants growing on the reed belts, but also the leaves of water lilies (Nymphea alba), serve as feed for cows and sheep. The latter cellulose-rich plants are a very good fodder that, as Kaul and Saraf (1984) have shown, contains 42.69–59.61 percent carbohydrates of dry matter and 15.10–23.16 percent crude protein of dry weight.19 Collecting these plants is usually the work of women (image 5.29) who feed them to their own animals. However, poorer women also collect and sell the leaves of water lilies to families who either cannot or do not want to do the work themselves. A boatload of water lilies, depending on the amount, is worth 50 to 150 rupees. At the end of the summer and in early autumn, animal fodder is also procured from willows and poplar trees by lopping off the smaller branches, which are then bundled and stored on the trees themselves. In winter, as the need arises, these leaves are then fed to cattle and sheep. Branches that

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Image 5.29. Bringing home reeds and water lily leaves as animal feed. Photo by the author.

are too thick to be eaten by the animals are used as firewood for the hearth (chūlha*) or are made into charcoal (tsünyi) for the typical Kashmiri fire pot (kāngrī), which is often carried under the traditional long coat (phēran) on cold winter days.20 Summarizing the various means by which the lake dwellers make a living, Lawrence (1895: 344–45, 1909: 57–58) wrote, But apart from the splendid produce of the rádh and demb lands, the cultivators of the Dal lake—the Mirbahri people as they are called in Kashmír—have other sources of food which the lake yields them free of labor. The singhara nut [Trapa natans] affords an easy meal which is not to be despised; the jewar [Euryale ferox] gives a pleasant seed which is eaten raw or parched; the bumbh [water lily], with its long stem and white flower, provides a nourishing vegetable from the former and an agreeable sharbat from the latter; and a warm, savoury vegetable in its leaf-stem, white, succulent. Lastly, and perhaps most useful of all, is the pits, the rush from which the matting of Kashmír is made; and this too gives a dainty food, known as the lake sweetmeat, which is made from the powder collected from the young rushes in the spring and boiled into consistency of cheese. The roots too, of the lake rush are eaten. (Lawrence 1895: 344–45)

Harvesting Water Nuts Next to fodder for the animals, the lake also provides the people living on Dal Lake with other sources of food that are especially important when crops

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fail due to extreme floods. In early September, some women and children harvest the fruits/seeds of the water caltrop, also called water chestnut or simply water nut (Trapa natans), that grows in some areas of Dal Lake and in the southern part of Nageen Lake (but see chapter 9). However, today, these water nuts (göri/singhara*) serve only as an auxiliary food for poorer zamindars. Earlier, in contrast, as Zutshi (1975) wrote quoting Lawrence (1895), “For the hanjis the dried fruits of these singhara were an important winter food but they also sold them to dealers who brought them to town but [they were] also exported to other countries.”21 These water nuts that “constitute a great portion of the food of the lower clefs of the natives, and the exclusive privilege of vending it, yield annually about twelve thousand pounds to the government” (Forster 1798: part 2, 29 and fn.; see also Doughty 1901: 29, 137; Simmonds 1888). For the late twentieth century as well, Haidar Malik Chadurah (1991: 30) reported in his Tarikh-i-Kashmir that Dal Lake “produces immense quantities of Singhara”; and as Bellew (1875: 68) wrote a century before, “The harvesting of the water nut was done on a large scale on the Dal: the fruit forms an important item as a breadstuff in the food products of the country.” The bulk of singhana, however, as reported in JRT: 943, was and still is harvested in Wular Lake. Moorcroft (n.d.) quoted in Sharma 1983: 128)22 wrote, [The singhara ] was the staple food of thousands residing on the banks of the Wular lake . . . and supported 5,000 people daily for many months in a year [especially] in the year 1893 during the big flood . . . when the main crop of the valley of Kashmir was destroyed, it was the flour of singhara which saved the people from starvation.23

Today, the nuts sold in Srinagar are brought exclusively from Wular Lake, but it is said that the water caltrop is becoming rarer there due to silting, encroachment, and pollution.24 Up until about the end of the nineteenth century, water nuts and lotus rhizomes were an important additional food in lean seasons. As Moorcroft (1932: 260, fn.) wrote, In the autumn, after the plate of the leaf [of the lotus] has begun to decay, the stem has acquired its full maturity, and, being boiled till tender, constitutes a wholesome, nutritious, and, I had almost said, palatable article of food.

He continued: It may be said that the water-nuts and the lotus-stalks are likely to prove but a limited resource; but in answer it may be remarked, that about thirty thousand individuals are here almost wholly supported by the former for five months out of twelve, and about five thousand persons live upon the lotus-stalk [rhizome] for nearly eight months in the city alone. The quantity of food capa-

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ble of being raised from an acre of water thickly planted with the Nymphæa nelumbo, and with the water-nuts, amounts to some tons.25

Harvesting the Lesser Bulrush and Weaving Mats All through the year, bundles of the leaves of the lesser bulrush (Typha angustifolia) called pēts or wagu gāz can be seen lined up to dry next to the gardens on the islands and raised fields. In the past, they were used to make ropes (raz*) and are still used today to make mats (wagu26)—a task carried out mainly by elderly women (see image 5.30). As Lawrence (1895: 69) reported for his time, “All boats are roofed with the pits matting, and the mats are employed as coverings for floors and in numerous other ways.” Today, shikaras are roofed with canvas or plastic sheets, but the mats are still laid on the floors of rooms in winter. They are made at the end of summer and sold in late autumn before the winter comes. These rush mats, which are about 3 meters long and 1.2 meters broad, are sold for about 500 rupees per piece. However, there are also very fine ones made to order. These are also bought by middlemen and transported to towns and villages in the hinterland. The next chapter will estimate the productivity, that is, the annual yield, of the lacustrine market gardening, and it will discuss the importance of vegetable production on Dal Lake, especially for the inhabitants of Srinagar.

Image 5.30. Weaving mats (wagu) from the leaves of the lesser bulrush. Photo by the author.

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Notes 1. Wani et al. (2013: 99), quoting LAWDA (2000, 2004–5), reported that “the lake now

2. 3. 4.

5. 6. 7. 8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

13. 14.

15.

shelters about 50 hamlets with a population of over 50,000 people, who have property rights over 300 ha (6,000 kanals) of agricultural land and 670 ha (13,400 kanals) of water area” (cf. chapter 6). An (iron) pot (nūṭ) on a lever for irrigating vegetables (sāg*). For the dendrochronological analysis of the tree profiles, I wish to thank Th. Frank (Laboratory of Dendrochronology, University of Cologne). Bano (1986) has shown that the dissolved oxygen level of Dal Lake, which can be taken as an indicator for the health of an aquatic system, is not low enough to seriously endanger aquatic life, although it is still far below the desired level. For details, see also Handoo and Kaul (1998: 217). For more detailed information about milfoils in Kashmir, especially in Dal Lake, see Arshid and Wani (2011) and Arshid et al. (2011). Nāv is a generic term for “boat” < skr: nau (Klaus, 1989). The term rab is related to the middle Indian (Prakrit) term rabbā (a gruel) and is also found as rāb in other modern Indian languages in which it means, for example, molasses or, in general, a mixture of liquid and solid substances (Walter Slaje, pers. comm.). Both aquatic ferns are highly productive. Azolla, for example, doubles its biomass in three to ten days, depending on conditions, and in Asian rice fields, the yield can reach eight to ten tons fresh matter/ha. In India, 37.8 t fresh weight/ha (2.78 t DM/ ha dry weight) has been reported for Azolla pinnata (Hasan and Chakrabarti 2009). For the nutrient content of different water plants from Dal Lake, see Handoo and Kaul (1998: table 15.3) who gathered together data obtained in the 1980s by Handoo and Kaul (1982), Kaul (1982), Kaul and Saraf (1984), Kaul et al. (1980), and Pandit (1984). See, for instance: Arora 1933: 39; Bruce 1911: 72; Drew 1875/1976: Hügel 1845: 112–13; Khan 1978: 77; Murray Aynsley 1879: 82–83; Norris 1989: 52; Petrococino 1920: 27–29; Swinburne 1923/1970: 117n279; Vigne 1881: 2:90–91. Even in the 1970s and 1980s, Myriophyllum spicatum was still the dominant species in most stretches of Dal Lake, and “Ceratophyylum demersum colonized [only] large tracts of the lake forming monospecific meadows” (Zutschi 1987: 572). In the years 2009 to 2017, however, the vegetation has undergone significant ecological change, and Myriophyllum became rare whereas Ceratophyllum became dominant in most parts of Dal and Nageen Lakes. Now gardeners must go to the very few places in the Dal where Myriophyllum can still be found. There are also some common areas where lotus grow and where anybody can harvest the nadru. Compare with nadorü (Grierson and Shastri 1932: 734), possibly related to nörü, a tendon, a tube, or the tough fibers or strings in a vegetable (Grierson and Shasti 1932: 649). It may relate to “a tube” (Sanskrit: nāḍ) and in other modern Indian languages to nārū: all types of tendon or plant fiber (Walter Slaje, pers. comm.). Gopalan et al. (1981: 74) give the following figures for the nutritional value per 100 edible rhizomes: Energy 53 kcal, carbohydrate 11.3 g, protein 4.7 g, fat 0.1 g, Ca 21

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mg, P 74 mg, Fe 0.4 mg. Compared to most other vegetables, they are rich in thiamine (0.1 mg) and vitamin C (22 mg). The UN defines disaster preparedness as involving “forecasting and taking precautionary measures prior to an imminent threat when advance warnings are possible.” This includes not only natural disasters but also all kinds of severe damage that can occur in a relatively short period (Kent 1994). See also chapter 7. The general term for dried vegetables: hokh syun, deriving from hokh = dry and syun = vegetable. The word hokhche added to a vegetable term indicates that it is a dried one. Thus al hokhche relates to dried gourds, rūwangan hokhche to dried tomatoes, and so forth. See also Handoo and Kaul (1998: 218) and Rather and Nazir (2015). The ascending smoke from the kāngrī, which spreads over a person’s chest, can cause a type of skin cancer, known as kangri cancer. See also Temple (1887: 2:55). Moorcroft (n.d.) MS EUR D. 264, pp. 245 and 300. According to Gopalan et al. (1981: 82), 100 g of fresh water nuts have the following nutritious values: energy 115 kcal, protein 4.7 g, fat 0.3 g, Ca 20 mg, P 115 mg, Fe 0.8 mg, thiamine 0.05 mg, vitamin C 9.0 mg. It is said that Moorcroft (ca. 1820) already warned the people that the whole lake would be filled up with earth over the course of one century (Temple 1887: 2:121). It can be supposed that when Moorcroft spoke about lotus stalks, he meant the rhizomes (nadru/nadur). Also, until about the middle of the twentieth century, the seeds of Euryale ferox (Nymphaeaceae) were also eaten—a plant that is now very rare in Kashmir. Grierson and Shastri (1932: 113): wagowuo, pētsi wagowu.

6  The Productivity of Lacustrine Market Gardening Any estimation of the agricultural productivity of Dal Lake and the potential income of its market gardeners requires information on both the individual and overall ownership of land, floating gardens, and lotus fields. It also requires information on the different sorts of vegetables and the carrying capacity of the different types of land, floating gardens, and lotus fields, as well as on which vegetables are cultivated in all seasons and which can be cultivated and harvested only in a specific period of the agrarian cycle. With these data at hand, the gross productivity of the market gardeners and, finally, the total income from the lacustrine economy can be estimated. However, in contrast to the arable land and the lotus fields that are cultivated every year and for which ownership is officially registered, there is no fixed ownership in the reed belts. Each market gardener can decide from year to year whether to use stretches of reeds to fabricate a floating garden and cultivate cucurbits.

Ownership of Arable Land, Lotus Fields, and Floating Gardens To first find out how the ownership of arable land and lotus gardens is distributed among the market gardeners, a sample of forty-six households was analyzed from one mohallah (kindly provided by the Department of Agriculture, Srinagar). The size of plots used to cultivate vegetables was calculated

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by adding together the irrigated land on the islands and raised fields (AGRO 1) and that in the moist littoral zone (AGRO 2). The agricultural data and the data on the size of the lotus gardens (given as kanals, and marlas1) were converted into hectares (ha) before being ranked and plotted against the individual households. As figure 6.1 shows, four categories of individual ownership can be distinguished: 1. Ten market gardeners were able to maximize their income due to the combined ownership of relatively large fields for cultivating vegetables together with large plots of lotus gardens (between 1.0 and 9.3 ha). 2. Eight households had very little or no land but possessed relatively large plots of lotus gardens (between 1.0 and 4.3 ha). 3. Nineteen households possessed only smaller plots of land and/or lotus gardens (below 1.0 ha). 4. Nine households owned neither land nor lotus fields. Of course, the results of this analysis of a small sample of forty-six households from one mohallah cannot be taken as a basis for extrapolating the ownership distribution pattern of the complete population of vegetable gardeners on the Dal. It shows only that next to a broad class of poor gardeners who possess very little arable land and/or lotus gardens, there are others who are relatively rich through owning either relatively large plots of land and lotus gardens or only large lotus gardens.

Figure 6.1. Ranked distribution of ownership (ha) of agricultural land and/or lotus gardens. Graph by the author, calculated from DPR 2000: table 2.14.

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Figure 6.2. Relation between number of households and ownership of arable land (ha). Source: Department of Agriculture, Srinagar. Note: The figure shows that the absolute majority of 2,924 households own only between 0.05 and 0.3 ha. One owner of 6.5 ha was not integrated into the figure. (Source: Department of Agriculture, Srinagar.)

A more precise idea regarding the distribution of land ownership on Dal Lake can be gained by analyzing data on a larger sample of 6,229 households published in the year 2000 by the AHEC (vol. 1, table 9.21, pp. 256–57) (figure 6.2). They reported that only 2,924 of these households (46.9 percent) are landowners and that the remaining 3,305 households possess only very small plots (≤ 0.05 ha) or no arable land at all. From the total area of 396.1 ha of owned land, 318.5 ha (80.4 percent) are under cultivation. The data show that the majority of market gardeners own acreages between only 0.05 and 0.30 ha with the exception of one very rich household owning a 6.5 ha plot that is omitted from the figure. There are also four households owning plots between 1.7 and 3.7 ha that, however, are not under cultivation. These might be built-up areas for houses, shops, or workshops.

Ownership of Land and the Inheritance and Adoption Systems Inheritance In all agricultural societies, the inheritance system reflects the wish to keep the land in family hands. Theoretically, inheritance rights in all Muslim societies follow the Quran (4: 11): “The male shall have the equal of the portion of two females.” Among the Shias in Kashmir, sisters and daughters who are married out of the village are given their share in cash and kind, but not in landed property. However, those who are married within the village

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have the right to a small share of landed property (Sharma 1983: 67–68, see also footnotes 60 and 65). For the land rights in medieval Kashmir see Kaw (1992). In the Ā’ῑn-i Akbarῑ by Abu’l Fażl (1894: vol. 3, fifth book, comprising the “Happy sayings of his majesty”), the emperor explained: The reason why under the Muhamadan law an inheritance seldom passes to the daughter notwithstanding that her helplessness seems deserving of greater consideration, is that she passes to her husband’s house and the legacy would go to a stranger. (p. 388)

When asked about daughters inheriting, the Dal market gardeners said that they were well aware of the Muslim laws of inheritance stipulating that daughters should inherit one-half of the brother’s share, but they say that when the daughter goes to another’s family, she always leaves her share to her brothers. Usually a small dowry of some thousand rupees is given that has only a symbolic value; and when the marriage contract is signed, the sum of the “morning gift” (mahr) is specified—the money that must be given to the wife in case of a divorce. If there is no son, the inheritance right can also follow a customary law (‘urf ) that is thought to be compatible with the Sharia. This recognizes two types of daughter. THE dokhtar-i-khāna birūn, THE dokhtar-i khāna nashīn, AND THE khānadāmād

Kashmiris differentiate between two types of daughter. The first are those who marry outside the house, which is usually the case, and are called dokhtar-i-khāna birūn* (daughter who leaves the house): Khana berun daughters are those daughters who are married outside the house. They present a picture of normal husband-wife-relationship and spend their post-marriage days in their in-law’s house or with the husband outside their parent’s house. (Ahangar 1986: 135)

This daughter, even if it is recognized that she should inherit a portion of the land, will not claim it and leaves what is usually her very small portion to her brothers. When, however, there is no son and only one or several daughters, one of the daughters will not marry out. For this so-called dokhtar-khāna nashīn* (daughter sitting in the house), “the conception seems to be that the father will treat her in all respects as a son” (Ahangar 1986: 153–60). For the daughter who remains in her parents’ house, the father, or the mother if there is no father, will look for a young man to marry her.2 If the young man chosen is willing to marry the “sitting daughter,” he will be integrated into the girl’s parental household. He is often the son of a poor family who now

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resides in the house of his future wife’s parents and is called khānādāmād* (son-in-law in the house). Because it is thought that he will be exploited and treated badly by his father-in-law, he is pitied by the people—as a Kashmiri proverb says: “Gari pett zamatur bara pett hoen” (If a son-in-law lives with his father-in-law, he is like a dog at the outer door).3 After the death of the girl’s father, the khānadāmād inherits the land and property of his father-in-law, just as a real son would. If the couple then has children, they can inherit land and property according to Muslim law (Lawrence 1895: 267–68). Such a situation is shown in the following kinship diagram (figure 6.3). Here a couple in the second generation had four daughters and only one son, who was adopted by the father’s brother because his marriage had remained childless. When all but one daughter had married out, a khānādāmād was found for the “sitting one” who later inherited land and property. It seems that this khānādāmād system has a long history, but it became very common under the influence of the forced labor system (bēgār*)4 in which family members were obliged to perform involuntary and unpaid labor, for example, as porters for the army or as laborers on state construction projects. This practice of bēgār has, as Kaw (1990) described in detail, a long history. It was first mentioned by Kalhaṇa in his Rājataraṅgiṅῑ 5 as rūḍhabhāroḍhi, the (encumbered) carrying of burden, and was reported by most chroniclers in subsequent periods. Forced labor was, as Kaw (1990: 466) wrote, extracted from different classes, including carpenters, weavers and other workmen. It was obtained from peasants and boatmen. Thus during the reign of Sultan Shihab-ud-Din (ad 1356–1374), unremunerated and compulsory labor was demanded from hanjis (boatmen), who were called upon to serve the king for seven days in every month.

Still in the time of the Dogra Rule (1846–1947) as Biscoe (1922: 236) reported: There was another matter which troubled them [the Kashmiris] much, and that was the forced labor on the Gilgit road. . . . At Bandipora they were collected and loaded up. The only rations allowed them was a seer of rice per day; this they had to carry, plus the straw for making their straw shoes, plus their load of food for the garrison. No provision was made for them as they crossed the snow passes, so that many died on the road, and often it happened that when they did reach Gilgit they were sold as slaves to the wild inhabitants of the inhospitable region.

It is said that in the times of Sikh rule (1820–46)6 when the khānādāmād system became very popular, many families brought in a poor boy as khānādāmād who was then sent for forced labor, so that a “real” son could

Figure by the author. Note: Exogamous zāt marriages are also indicated along with the men’s occupations.

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Figure 6.3. Kinship relations in a family showing a case of an adoption and a khānadāmād/dukhtār-i-khāna nashin marriage.

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stay with the family (Kaw 1990; Sharma 1983: 148). Lawrence (1895: 267) reported, When a man’s daughter is three years old, and he cannot arrange for her marriage with a near relative he will take a boy into the house (khána damád), and this boy, until he marries the daughter of the house, has to work like a drudge. The system of khána dámadi is said to have become common in Sikh times, and if forced labor was wanted for transport the unfortunate khána damádi was always sent. If he came back alive he won his bride. If he died it did not matter as the son of the house, at any rate, escaped.

Adoption Adopting a male child if a couple has no son is a very common practice in the Kashmir valley and especially among rural farmers and the market gardeners on the Dal. It ensures that the inheritance of the land remains within the family. As the example in figure 6.3 shows, the son of a couple in the second generation was adopted by the father’s brother’s whose marriage remained childless. Unlike the khānadāmād system, this custom does not accord with Islamic law: according to the Quran (8: 75; 33: 4–5), an adoption does not end the blood relations between the child and his real parents and siblings, nor does it create a real relationship between him and his adoptive parents and their children. But as Sant Ram Dogra (1930) pointed out in his Code of Tribal Custom in Kashmir (quoted in Ahangar 1986: 195): Adoption [in Kashmir] is of Hindu origin and has been maintained among the Muslims in spite of all the bigoted attacks against this institution for the last six hundred years. The Zamindars of the valley still think an adopted son [called pisarparvada*] as good an heir as a real son.

This system of adoption is still very common in Kashmir, as evidenced by a well-known riddle that goes: Bayeh miano kolyeh mianeh hindeh nechou, Ateh daptoo majeh panneh bouy Meon choui aalav karan

(You, my brother and son of my wife, tell your mother that she is wanted by your brother. The answer is: the brother was adopted as son) (CIJK 1961: 63). The term pisarparvada* was introduced in an effort to circumvent Islamic law. This means “appointed” and is said to be different from pisarmutbana*, the term used for a “real adoption.” The former term owes its origin to a decree of Maharaja Pratab Singh (1540–97).7 It was said that pisarparvada means

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a purely secular arrangement resorted to by a sonless owner of land in order to nominate a person to succeed him as his heir. Sunnis as well as Shi’as usually appoint a boy as heir when he is about one year old[,] and when the boy is grown up the . . . appointer secures the assistance of the appointed heir in the cultivation[,] and after his death the appointed inherits the estate of his appointer to the exclusion of the appointive father’s collaterals. (Ahangar 1986: 197)

The pisarparvada has no right of collateral succession and can inherit only from his adopting father. It is said that the pisarparvada system is entirely different from adoption among Hindus, because the appointed Muslim son does not cease to be a member of his natural family. In the Hindu adoption system, the adoptee is transplanted into the family of the adopter, loses all ties to his natural family, and becomes a child of his adoptive parents. He acquires not merely the right to succeed to his adoptive parents and their lineal ancestors, but also the right of collateral succession.8

The Agricultural Year Vand cheli, sheen galie beyi yie bahar (Winter will be over, snow will melt, and spring will come again) (Kashmiri proverb).

All-Seasons Vegetables The agricultural year in Kashmir consists of two cycles. The first starts after nowroz*, the spring (sōnṭ) festival on 20 or 21 March. But, depending on the weather, agricultural activities may be postponed until the beginning or even the middle of April.9 This is the most important time of the year. The plots on the islands and the raised fields are now prepared for cultivation, and strips of reeds are chosen and cleared of weeds to make the floating gardens. Normally, the lotus gardens do not need any attention, although some owners clear them from such invaders as water lilies and other unwanted water plants. Land is usually not left fallow, due not only to its scarcity but also to its fertility through being fed regularly with compost and mud from the bottom of the lake. In recent times, chemical fertilizers have also been used by some rich gardeners with large plots of land. Before sowing and/or planting vegetables, the land is first aerated with a hoe (ṭongūr) and sometimes also with a spade (bēl). Then compost (pah) prepared from water plants or sometimes chemical fertilizer10 is spread over the land and mixed with the soil (see image 5.9). After this, young plants that have been raised from seed (bjōl, bīj*) in nurseries (image 6.1) are planted

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Image 6.1. A nursery being prepared for sowing different vegetables. Photo by the author.

out in the fields, or seed itself is sown directly into the soil.11 Nurseries in particular, but also the newly replanted land, are traditionally lift-irrigated with the lever described in the previous chapter, but nowadays this is also frequently done with diesel pumps. Depending on the weather, most vegetables can be planted and harvested two to three times between spring and the beginning of autumn. Those such as green peppers (hari mirc*), eggplants (wāngun), or tomatoes (ruwāngun, tomatār*),12 which grow and are harvested exclusively in the summer months, are brought out late in spring, as are all the cucurbits cultivated on the floating gardens and along the moist shores of islands and raised fields. Since about the beginning of the last century, some gardeners have specialized in cultivating flowers (Little 1956: 106) that are also sown in early spring and cut over the year—mainly to be sold to the tourists on the houseboats. This second cycle begins with the arrival of autumn (hārud, mezān*) at the end of September or beginning of October. Now the land is prepared for growing winter vegetables (image 6.2). Again compost is tilled into the soil, and the different vegetables are sown or transplanted from nurseries. These also include many of the summer vegetables that can also endure the cold season (table 6.1). The most important are kohlrabi, radish, turnips, carrots, spinach, and most of the pot herbs (hāk/hākh).13

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Image 6.2. Fields on an island prepared for the cultivation of winter vegetables. Photo by the author.

Table 6.1. The most important vegetables cultivated and harvested in all seasons and only in summer. All SEASONS

IN SUMMER ONLY

ENGLISH

KASHMIRI

ENGLISH

KASHMIRI

Beetroot

chogandar

Bitter gourd

tāarela

Cabbage

bandgōbhi*

Bottle gourd

al

Carrot

gāzar*

Coriander

dānyiwāl

Cauliflower

Phulgōbhi*

Cucumber

lār

Kohlrabi

munje

Eggplant

wāngun

Kohlrabi leaves

munje hākh

Garlic

rohan

Potato

olu*

Green pepper

harimirc*

Radish

mūji

Onion

prān

Spinach

pālak*

Ridge gourd

kārela

Turnip

gōg ji

Tomato

ruwāngan

*Rendered from Urdu

All these can be harvested over the whole winter period until about March/April of the next year, when the agricultural cycle starts again.14 Of great importance in the time between late autumn and March/April of the next year is the harvesting of lotus rhizomes (nadru).

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Raising Cucurbits in the Riparian Zone and on Floating Gardens Alongside the vegetables cultivated on the islands and raised fields, there are also the cucurbits. The most important are the bottle gourd or calabash (Lagenaria siceranis),15 called al; the ridge gourd (tarēl), Momordica charantia; the bitter gourd (karēl), Luffa acutangula (images 6.3a-c–); and the cucumber (Cucumis sativus), called lēṛ.16 As described in chapter 5, these plants are raised on the islands from seed sown in cones made from water plants and mud before being transplanted to the moist edges (labūr/labrō) of the islands, raised fields, or floating gardens. All these cucurbits can be harvested only in summer from May until the beginning of September (figure 6.7b).

Constraints, Decision-Making, and the Agrarian Cycle Peasants are continually faced with economic decisions; and their assessments of risk and their choice among various investment strategies shape their relationships with their families, village, patrons, and the world beyond the village. —Popkin 1979

Every year, at the beginning of the agricultural cycle, the market gardener must decide which vegetables to cultivate on his plot or different plots. These decisions have to be reconsidered when the next cultivation phase begins in autumn. Under the constraint of limited acreage, the market gardener’s decisions are based on:

Image 6.3a–c. The bottle gourd, the bitter gourd, and the ridge gourd. Photos by the author.

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1. what he has cultivated before on his land or on his different plots of land; 2. his knowledge about the quality of his land that determines its carrying capacity in relation to the nutritional needs of the different vegetables he can cultivate; 3. his estimate of the profit to be made from the different vegetables after harvesting. He can also decide whether to increase his yield and augment his profit by constructing floating gardens to cultivate one or different sorts of cucurbits and/or tomatoes. This also enables him to reduce the risk of losing all his land-based crop through flooding. All these strategies and decisions have to be considered against the background of his family’s work capacity and whether he can afford to employ agricultural laborers. Of course, due to the unpredictable future, incomplete information, and incomplete knowledge, there is no optimal strategy. The gardeners’ decisions are only educated guesses based on many years of experience combined with and supported by their community’s information network.

The Productivity of Dal Market Gardening Until now, no reliable data are available on the acreage of the different fields and gardens on the Dal. In 1899, Lawrence (1895: 20n1) gave the following estimated measures: “[The Dal] covers an area of 9.98 square miles [25.86 km2]. Of this area 1,890 acres [764.86 ha] consist of ḍēmb or fixed cultivation, so that the total area of the Dal under water and floating gardens is 7.3 square miles [19.03 km2].” For the years 1984–85, Bano (1986: table 1) reported “that out of the 21 km2 of the lake, 8.6 km2 are given to agriculture.” He estimated that from the total of land (150 ha), 120 ha are under cultivation, and that 210 of the 420 ha of floating gardens17 are cultivated. Further on, he reported that from the 290 ha of marshes,18 87 ha are covered with lotus. However, all this information must be treated with caution. Lawrence gave no sources for his data, and Bano specified his method of data collection as “interviews with the farmers on the Dal Lake.” Recently Qadri and Yousuf (2008: 1455) reported 450 ha of arable land quoting the “Dal Dweller’s Zamindar Union.” Naturally, without accurate data on the sizes of the different types of agricultural plots and without information on their carrying capacity, it is not possible to calculate the overall productivity of agrarian produce from the Dal. However, satellite images might help provide a more reliable estimate of the overall productivity of the arable land on the islands and the raised fields.

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Estimating the Market Gardeners’ Productivity Using Remote Sensing Data SOME WORDS ON THE METHOD APPLIED Nowadays, high-resolution remote sensing data is a common tool for analyses. Typically, the approach is to try and reduce the enormous amount of data by transforming the unregulated pixel mass into a thematic map of the issue being examined. In this study, the object of investigation is small in scale, because some of the crop areas are only a few meters wide. Therefore, only high-resolution remote sensing data can be used. Hence, World View 2 data was obtained that had been recorded on 23 April 2011 in 0.5-centimeter panchromatic resolution and eight spectral bands in 2-meter resolution. The spectral bands cover the visible and near infrared up to 1 micrometer (µm). The far infrared bands make it possible to identify the water/land discrimination very easily due to the strongly different reflection of land and water in high-infrared wavelengths. The transformation of the remaining area into different land use data was done with a pixel-based classification technique. This data fusion technique uses the same spectral information on individual pixels to classify all pixels in similar classes. Manifold algorithms and parameters are used to optimize the result of the classification. First, the selection of areas to train the determined classes: here expert knowledge about the land use and ground control was used. Second, after model training, an algorithm had to be chosen to separate the point clouds in the n-dimensional space of the different spectral bands. In this case, the commonly applied “maximum likelihood” method was used to separate different land use (e.g., urban areas, several types of acreage, green areas with trees, and other). Based on the classification result, the Geographical Information System (GIS) was used to calculate the portion of each area class and to present the data in maps (for detailed information, see, e.g., Lillesand, Kiefer, and Chipman 2008).

Estimating the Acreage through Remote Sensing Figure 6.4 presents a false-color image of Dal Lake and the surrounding areas, and figure 6.5 presents a classification based on ground truth data collected during fieldwork. Figures 6.6a and 6.6b shows on the left side the area marked in the false color image (figure 6.4), and on the right side, a detailed classification of the same area to provide some idea of the quality of the method applied. The calculation based on classifying the three most important structures on Dal Lake gave the following results: water: 28,400.0 ha; agricultural land on islands and raised fields: 824.5 ha; and settlements and roads: 366.0 ha.

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Figure 6.4. False-color image of the Dal Lake and adjacent areas. Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06.

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Figure 6.5. Classification of the Dal Lake and adjacent areas using remote sensing data. Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. Note: “white” signifies water; “brown,” agricultural areas; and “black,” buildings, houseboats, and roads. (Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06.)

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Figure 6.6a, b. Classification of the framed area in figure 6.4. Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. Notes: Left: false-color image. Right: Classification: green = arable land; black = populated area (houses) and roads; blue = water; and white = unclassified, mainly very shallow water, algae, and water plants. (Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06.)

Estimating the Yield from the Arable Land on the Islands and Raised Fields As described above, the ever-changing agronomic strategies of the individual market gardeners as well as the unpredictable weather conditions make it impossible to calculate precisely how many of the different vegetables are cultivated annually on Dal Lake. Thus, the following estimate can only convey an idea about the order of magnitude of the market gardeners’ productivity. Due to their long experience, the market gardeners of Dal Lake know the carrying capacity of their land and what yields to expect. It is therefore reasonable to take advantage of their knowledge and collect the relevant data through group discussions. The information on their expected minimum and maximum annual yield for the most important vegetables in a “normal year” is shown in table 6.2.

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Table 6.2. Annual minimal and maximal carrying capacity for the most important vegetables on Dal Lake’s islands and raised fields (kg/kanal), as communicated by the market gardeners. CARRYING CAPACITY MIN

MAX

AVERAGE

YIELD

CROPS

kg/kanal*

kg/kanal*

kg/kanal*

t/ha

Beet

600

700

650

13

Cabbage

1,200

1,500

1,350

27

Carrot

1,200

1,300

1,250

25

Cauliflower

1,000

1,200

1,100

22

Kohlrabi

1,700

2,000

1,850

37

Radish

1,300

1,400

1,350

27

Spinach

600

700

650

13

Turnip

1,400

1,500

1,450

29

AVERAGE

1,125

1,287.5

1,206.3

24.125

*20 kanal = 1 ha Note: The calculated average amount (kg/kanal) is also converted into t/ha.

This information on the gardeners’ expected minimum and maximum yield was used to calculate an average (kg/kanal) that was then converted into t/ha. The data ranged between 13 and 37 t/ha with an average of 24.1 t/ha. Multiplying this average by the known acreage of arable land on the Dal gained from the classified satellite image (824.5 ha) suggests an annual yield of about 20,000 tons. Nonetheless, this is based on the assumption that the farmers cultivate only those vegetables listed in table 6.2 on all their plots. However, it can be supposed—and this is also my impression—that only about two-thirds of the total acreage (549.6 ha) is used to cultivate cabbages, tubers, and root vegetables with an average yield of 24.1 t/ha. This suggests an annual yield of 13,245 tons. From the remaining one-third of the land (274.8 ha), it can be assumed that one-half is used to cultivate a variety of about 8 t/ha (400 kg/kanal) of all other seasonal vegetables, and especially the different potherbs.19 This indicates that 1,099.2 t are produced on the 137.4 ha. For the other half of the land that is used to cultivate only summer vegetables such as tomatoes and eggplants, the estimate is about 30 t/ha (1,500 kg/kanal). This means that an annual yield of 4,122 tons can be gained from these 137.4 hectares. To summarize, from a total acreage of 824.5 ha, the market gardeners can expect an annual yield of 18,466.2 tons.20

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Estimating the Yields from Floating Gardens and from the Edges of Islands and Raised Fields It is more difficult to estimate the carrying capacity of the floating gardens and the gardens stretched out along the shores of the islands and raised fields. For both areas, the satellite image classification method employed here cannot distinguish especially the rāds on which cucurbits are grown from the majority of those that are not being exploited economically. For the same reason, the cucurbit gardens along the shore cannot be distinguished from the trees that usually overshadow these gardens. Nonetheless, some data on the productivity of the floating gardens are available. Moorcroft (1832: 262) did not distinguish between the types of cucurbits growing on the floating gardens, but it can be assumed that he was talking about the big calabash (al) when he wrote the following: I employed a servant of mine, who lived amongst the water gardeners, to obtain an accurate account of the yield of a cone [pōkur]. He stated, that in answer to his inquiries, the gardeners acknowledged that thirty full-sized fruit from each plant, or ninety to a hundred from each cone, were the average crop in the season.

When I asked some of the gardeners about the annual productivity of floating gardens, they told me that in a good year, they can harvest about one hundred calabash from one pōkur with three to four plants. Because about three pōkurs can be positioned on one meter of the rād, this would mean that more than three thousand calabashes can be harvested per season on a ten-meter stretch.21 These different cucurbits grown on the floating gardens make a major contribution to the total amount of vegetables produced on the lake. But because the number of cultivated rāds changes from year to year, and also because the range in weight of the different kinds of cucurbits (cucumbers as well as striped, bitter, and bottle gourds) is not known, a conservative estimate would be four thousand tons of cucurbits every year from the floating gardens. However, far more gourds and cucumbers are cultivated along the moist shores of most of the islands and raised fields so that, taken together, a rough estimate would be ten thousand tons per year.

Estimating the Yield from the Lotus Gardens No data are available on the amount of lotus rhizomes (nadru) harvested. Only Bhatt (1998: 546) reported that “several thousand mounds are brought into the city and disposed of by public sale.” In order to estimate how many of the nadru are harvested each year under “normal conditions,” the water areas in the region in which they are mainly cultivated were estimated with the help of the classified satellite image (figure 6.7).

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Figure 6.7. Classification of water areas in the main region where lotus are cultivated. Source: Copyright 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06.

The data from the different parts of the region give the following results: Table 6.3. Total and water areas (ha) of the different parts where lotus rhizomes are mainly cultivated. Total Area (ha)

Water (ha)

Part 1

28.1

14

Part 2

60

26.7

Part 3

90

34.1

Part 4

194.2

68.5

Part 5

59.7

23

Part 6

28.9

13.7

SUM

460.9

180.0

The owners of the gardens report that one kanal (0.05 ha) generates some 200 bundles (gird*) of lotus rhizomes per year—that is, 4,000 bundles per ha. Each bundle contains 7–10 nadru. Depending on size and quality, these weigh between 800 and 1,000 grams. Even supposing that only half of the

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area shown to be water is used to cultivate nadru (90 ha), there is an annual yield of 324.0 t (calculated at an average weight of 900 g per bundle). In summary, for a supposed “normal year,” it can be estimated that 18,460 tons of vegetables are produced on the arable land on islands and raised fields, some 10,000 tons of cucurbits from the floating gardens and the edges of islands and raised fields, and some 324 tons of rhizomes from the lotus gardens. Thus, the total yield in vegetables produced by the horticultural community on the Dal is 28,784 tons per season. However, due to some incalculable factors (different soil qualities, use of artificial fertilizer and pesticides in some cases) and the dependence of the estimated carrying capacity on the aforementioned factors, it is reasonable to state only that the market gardeners on the Dal have an annual yield of between 20,000 and 40,000 tons.

Estimating the Profit from Dal Lake’s Lacustrine Economy To estimate the gross profit on vegetable sales, the monthly supply and pricing (Rs/kg) for the different vegetables were examined in 2012 and 2013 by interviewing vegetable shop owners in Srinagar. The data (figures 6.8a–6.8d) show relatively small differences in the market price: 1. For all-season vegetables, prices lie between 20 and 40 Rs/kg. The only exception is spinach, which can go up to 60 Rs/kg. 2. For vegetables harvested only in the summer months, such as sweet peppers, eggplants, and tomatos, prices range between 30 and 50 Rs/kg. 3. For different cucurbits, prices range between 200 and 400 Rs/kg. 4. For lotus rhizomes with an average weight of 800–1,000 grams per bundle, the average price is between 200 and 300 Rs/kg.

Figure 6.8a. Monthly availability and market price for all-season vegetables. Figure by the author.

Figure 6.8b. Monthly availability of summer vegetables. Figure by the author.

Figure 6.8c. Monthly availability of cucurbits. Figure by the author.

Figure 6.8d. Monthly availability of lotus rhizomes. Figure by the author. Note: The figures show the monthly up- or down-rounded averages of three surveys at the beginning, middle, and end of the respective month.

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Random sampling in the following years showed a quite stable consistency in pricing for all these vegetables. This can be explained through the high and constant supply in a normal year. The potential income of vegetable vendors can be calculated with the following average estimates (Rs/kg): 1. For all-season vegetables from the arable land (13,245 t + 1,099.2 t), an average price of 35.0 Rs/kg. 2. For those harvested only in summer, 40 Rs/kg. 3. For the different cucurbits from the floating gardens and the edges of the islands and raised fields, an average price of 300 Rs/kg. 4. For the nadru (the lotus rhizomes) harvested between January to March and again from October to December, a price of 250 Rs/kg. Thus, for all-season vegetables from arable land (14,344 t), sales based on an average price of 35.0 Rs/kg would generate about 50.2 crore (50.27 Rs). The different vegetables harvested only in summer on 137.4 ha based on 40 Rs/ kg, would generate about 16.5 crore (16.57 Rs). For the different cucurbits from the floating gardens and from the edges of the islands and raised fields estimated at 10,000 t/year, an average price of 300 Rs/kg would generate approximately 300 crore (3007 Rs). The 324 t of nadru, harvested between Jan to March and from October to December and sold for 250 Rs/kg, would generate about 8.1 crore (8.17 Rs). Hence, the vegetable vendors generate a total of 374.8 crore (374.87 Rs) per year. As a conservative estimate, vegetables are sold for a value between 300 and 400 crore in a “normal year.” However, market gardeners sell their produce to wholesale vegetable merchants on the floating market (table 6.4) or at the sabzi maṇḍī* (wholesale vegetable market)22 in town for about two-thirds of the prices that the vendors finally obtain. Therefore, it can be calculated that the market gardeners on the Dal generate 249.9 crore (249.97 Rs),23 but it would be reasonable to state only that they generate about 200 to 300 crore (2007 and 3007 Rs). Only poor families with very little land sell their produce on the roadside (see image 5.26). However, the monthly or annual income of each individual household depends on the acreage of land and lotus fields it owns and on the number of floating gardens it creates. Due to the uneven distribution of ownership (see figures 6.1 and 6.2), with few rich gardeners and many relatively poorer ones, there are great differences in the income of individual households. DRP (2000: 1:266) gave a monthly average income of 2,557.47 Rs for the cultivators, whereby the majority earn between 1,000 and 3,000 Rs. There are 401 households earning below 1,000 Rs per month and 556 with a monthly income between 3,000 and 7,000 Rs. Seventy-three households earn be-

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tween 7,000 and 10,000 Rs, and only one household earns more than 10,000 Rs per month (DRP 2000, table 9.72, p. 265).

Market Relations Every morning between 5:00 and 7:00, up to two hundred market gardeners come together with their boats on an open body of water between the islands in the south of Dal Lake called the Floating Vegetable Market (image 6.4). This is where the market gardeners bring their vegetables to sell to the owners of vegetable shops and hotels, who come in their own boats or hire ones for the occasion. Many of the vegetables are also sold to the traders in the wholesale vegetable market in Srinagar, who resell them to the owners of vegetable and grocery shops where they are purchased by the city dwellers (table 6.4). Likewise, most owners of houseboats prefer to purchase their vegetables in town. It would require much effort for them to take a boat to the Floating Vegetable Market very early in the morning. When buying the vegetables in the Srinagar shops, they can also purchase any other goods they need. Because this market is also a major tourist attraction in Kashmir, there are also boats offering sweets, coffee, or tea, or selling papier-mâché items, jewelry, wood carvings, and other souvenirs for tourists. Moreover, along some

Image 6.4. The Floating Vegetable Market. Photo by the author.

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Table 6.4. Prices of winter vegetables in the Floating Market and in the Srinagar greengrocers in December 2017.

VEGETABLE

FLOATING MARKET

GREENGROCERS SRINAGAR

Rs/kg

Rs/kg

KASHMIRI

Bean

40

60

bēn

Beet

80

110

chōgandar

Cabbage

20

30

gōbi

Carrot

20

30

gajir

Cauliflower

30

40

pulgōbi

hāk

20

30

hāk

hanz hāk

80

120

hanz hāk

Kohlrabi

16

25

munje

Kohlrabi leaves

20

30

munje hāk

Lotus rhizome

150

250

nadru

Potato

15

25

ōlu

Radish

30

40

mūji

Spinach

25

40

pālak

Turnip

14

20

gōg ji

of the waterways next to the Floating Vegetable Market, there are many shops built on wooden stilts selling arts and crafts to tourists or providing them with different consumer goods (image 6.5). These belong mainly to members of the Shia community.

Broadening the Economic Basis As Etienne (2010: 25–30) pointed out for the example of Pakistan, economic diversity such as employment outside the agrarian sector alleviates poverty in peasant communities. Without statistical material at hand, my observations among the market gardeners of Dal Lake corroborate the hypothesis that the number of (mainly male) family members and the diversification of jobs correlates positively with family income and wealth. As reported, the majority of market gardeners own acreages smaller than one kanal (cf. figures 6.1 and 6.2). As a result, they have little surplus to sell. Nevertheless, there are always enough vegetables for the household, and together with some chickens, ducks, and often also one or two cows, they can cover the basic nutritional needs of the family. In fact, regarding food, most

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Image 6.5. Tourist shops on stilts near the Floating Vegetable Market. Photo by the author.

gardeners are subsistent, but they are always short of the cash needed to buy everything they cannot produce themselves (e.g., flour, rice, salt, and tea but also clothing, shoes, etc.),24 or to cover such expenses as house repairs. With the growth of the family and with arable land that usually cannot be extended or can be extended only slowly (by constructing raised fields), few men are needed to work the plots. Consequently, some family members try to take jobs outside the agrarian sector to broaden the family’s economic basis. The two kinship diagrams (figure 6.9) show that the forefathers of these two families were landowners who tilled only their own vegetable gardens. In the following generations, only two sons still worked on the family’s land, but they also owned vegetable shops. One of the sons had only a vegetable shop, but all others had different occupations, such as those requiring labor. Some members of gardener families also take their boats to the households on the islands and the owners of houseboats and sell different commodities on a commission basis, such as various plastic items or fabrics that are then tailored by members of other market gardener families. Others specialize in selling cigarettes, soft drinks, and cookies to houseboat tourists, whereas yet others, who are employed in the city at factories and tourist shops, also visit the houseboats to sell papier-mâché, woodcarvings, jewelry, shawls, saffron, nuts, and so forth (images 7.11 and 7.14). And others work in Srinagar in factories or as government employees, as clerks or gardeners, or are employed by the municipality to paddle to the islands and houseboats and collect the

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Figure 6.9. Economic diversification in two market gardener families. Figure by the author. Note: In both families, only one son still lives from gardening, and two combine tilling their own land with running vegetable shops. All others have different occupations.

garbage, mainly plastic bags and bottles that—it is said—are brought partly to other Indian states to be recycled or burned outside the city.25 Moreover, in order to augment the family’s income, many women and also children are employed in knotting carpets. Here the dyed wool and looms are supplied by a contractor, a carpet merchant from the city who also specifies the size and pattern of carpet that he will collect when complete. He knows how many weeks or even months are needed for a given number of weavers to finish the ordered carpet—who are then paid accordingly. As already mentioned (see images 5.29), the women of poorer families also collect the leaves of water lilies or reeds to sell as animal feed. They may also weave reed mats (see image 5.30).

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In the days when only waterweeds were used as compost/fertilizer, when pesticides were not applied, and when the influx of nutrients from the city and from the catchment area was minimal, not only were the market gardeners broadly subsistent through Dal Lake’s produce but their economy, unlike today, was also sustainable. Those who owned enough land could sell their harvest surplus;26 the poorer households could augment their income by selling some products they fabricated (e.g., reed mats and carpets). But today, more and more members of the families have to take jobs outside the agrarian sector (figure 6.10).

Nutritional Needs, Food Security, and the Market Gardeners of the Dal Next to the staple rice, the most important food in Kashmir was and still is the produce from the vegetable gardens.27 As Moorcroft and Trebeck (1837/1976: 2:132) already observed in the early nineteenth century: The food of those who can afford it is partly of meat, mutton of goat or sheep. . . . [But] the chief food of the people is vegetable; turnips, cabbages, and radishes, the Sinhara, or water nut, and rice. . . . Besides these, lettuces, spinach, and other common vegetables are in extensive use or even the leaves of the dandelion, dock [Rumex spec.], plantain, and mallow [Malva neglecta];28 and the catkins of the walnut are employed as food.

Figure 6.10. Dependence of the Dal market gardeners’ economy on the lacustrine ecosystem, the products they generate, and their relation to the market. Figure by the author.

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And about the general importance of vegetables, Sharma (1983: 57) reported for the 1980s that vegetables were consumed by the poor and the rich alike. The most common vegetables were Knol-Khol (Munji), Karam Sag (Hak), Turnip (Gogji), Pumpkin (Aal), Cucumber (Lar), Eggplant (Wangan), Radish (Tarub), Sponge gourd (Tarela), Bitter Gourd (Karela), Carrot (Gajar), Spinach (Palak), Chili (Mirchwangan) and Trigonella (Methi) and Lotus roots (Nadru). The marrow and catkins of the walnut, the dock, common mallow and dandelions were consumed by the poor. Dried vegetables and pickles were consumed especially in the winter.

All visitors to Kashmir in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries reported that most people were very poor and that, until about the end of the nineteenth century, the water caltrop or water chestnut (singhara*) and lotus rhizome were, next to some winter vegetables, the most important sources of food between the growing seasons. As Moorcroft and Trebeck 1837/1977: 136) said of water nuts, Another principal article of food of the common people, the Sinhara, or water nuts, grow abundantly in the different lakes in the vicinity of the capital, and especially in the Wular lake. . . . It constitutes the almost only food of at least thirty thousand persons for five months in the year.

And for the lotus rhizomes, the nadru, he reported, In autumn, after the plate of the leaf has begun to decay, [they have] acquired maturity, and, being boiled till tender, furnish a wholesome and nutritious article, which supports, perhaps, five thousand persons in the city for nearly eight months. (p. 137)

Famines were a recurrent phenomenon. In the nineteenth century, the worst famines after the one in 1831 were in the years 1877–79 (Neve 1913: 30–31), when the population of Kashmir was reduced from 800,000 to 200,000 inhabitants and that of Srinagar from 127,400 to 60,000 inhabitants (Khan 1978: 23–25, Lawrence 1895: 213). Another famine occurred only fourteen years later in 1893. As Khan (1978: 23) noted, flooding severely affected the supply of vegetables to the city: [It] swept away most of the bridges in the city, and damaged houses, besides submerging the lake gardens, destroying the melons, cucumbers, vegetable marrows and tomatoes, which form an important part of the citizen’s diet in the summer.

In the twentieth century, all reports between 1989 and 2000 emphasized that the production of vegetables on Dal Lake is of utmost importance for

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meeting the nutritional needs of Srinagar’s inhabitants (e.g. IGI 1909: 57– 58). However, in their endeavor to combat pollution and the accelerating degradation of the Dal, the departments of the Kashmiri government have often blamed, next to the owners of houseboats, the market gardeners. As will be described and analyzed in detail in chapters 9 and 10, a resettlement program was launched in the 1980s that may have serious consequences for the supply of vegetables for the city. Bano (1986: 39) warned, To remove these gardens and return the area to clear water status would entail a great loss of vegetable production which would be difficult to recover from other areas, as Srinagar city is wholly dependent on these vegetables.

And in the same vein, Trisal (1987: 44) remarked, “Traditionally the markets of Srinagar have been supplied from the famous floating gardens and irrigated land within the lake areas.” Two years later in 1989, the consultants wrote in their report: The Dal and the Nagin Lakes are an important source of fresh vegetables for Srinagar. The Directorate of Agriculture is of the opinion that these areas (but principally the Dal) account for 50 percent of vegetable supply to the city. 7,000 hectares are thought to be under cultivation. The fertility enables high crop yields to be obtained (for example, 25 tons of tomatoes per hectare) and three crops to be grown a year. Estimates by the Directorate indicate that the lakes produce 18,000 tons of vegetables a year. (APC/ODA 1989: 25)

As described in chapter 9 and as can be seen in figure 9.1b, the population has grown tremendously not only around Dal Lake but also on the islands. As a result, more and more arable land has been lost to building construction in the last thirty years. This loss has been compensated in part by constructing more raised fields and encroaching more and more into the lake so that enough vegetables will still be produced. The production and distribution of fresh vegetables to the city dwellers has always become crucial during times of political unrest, as in the summer and autumn months of 2016. In that year, due to month-long strikes (hartal*), all shops in Srinagar were closed. But the market gardeners came from all over the lake to the Floating Vegetable Market, and this became the most important place where the townspeople could still buy vegetables (Hindustan Times 26.08.2016). Surely, with the call to “Save the Lake,” the massive encroachments into the lake must be curbed, but the food security and nutritional situation of Srinagar’s population must be kept in mind before engaging in any large-scale rehabilitation and resettlement of the Dal’s market gardeners.

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Notes 1. 1 hectare = 20 kanals; 1 kanal = 20 marlas. 2. It can be argued that this custom has its roots in the Hindu legal system; see Manusmṛti 9, 127.

3. Similar proverbs regarding the situation of a man living in his father-in-law’s house are known from Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, and Haryana (Chowdhry 1997: 306).

4. For details on this system, see also Lawrence (1929: 133–34). 5. See Kalhana RT 5.172 (King Śaṅkaravarman, 889–902), RT 7.1088 (King Harṣa,

6. 7.

8.

9.

10.

11.

12.

1089–1101), and Jonarāja: RT 80 (King Rājadeva, 1213–35); Walter Slaje, pers. comm. Especially under Sikh rule, the Kashmiris were taxed extremely heavily; as Sharma’s (1983: appendix 6: 297–99) list shows, no one was exempted. It is told that, after the death of a certain saint named Ditta who had adopted a boy named Ghulam Ahmad, the heritage was denied to the adoptee by the revenue authorities who argued that adoption is not allowed under Muslim law. When Ghulam Ahmad brought the matter to the notice of the Maharaja Pratab Singh, he decreed that Ghulam Ahmad was an appointed son and not an adopted son, and what Islam prohibits is adoption not appointment (Ahangar 1986: 194). Among the six different types of sons listed in Manu Smriti (9, 127), two are of interest here: “The son of a man from his legal wedded wife is called an aurasa putra [auras, produced/belonging to the breast]. On the other hand, an adopted son is called a dattak putra [datta, adopted].” This son is called dattrima (Katju 2010). The Persian/Urdu terms rabῑ and kharῑf used in most parts of northern India for the spring and the autumn harvest respectively are not known among the market gardeners on the lake. Nonetheless, they are used in the files of administrative departments in Srinagar. If chemical fertilizers are used, it is said that a twenty-kilogram bag, which costs between three and four hundred rupees, is sufficient for one kanal. For some decades now, gardeners who can afford it also buy pesticides that are available in some retail shops and warehouses. This practice runs counter to the government’s efforts to promote the production of healthy organic vegetables. According to the law, these pesticides may be sold only by licensed traders especially for use in apple plantations (Baba et al. 2012). Nonetheless, the Horticulture Department swings into action only intermittently to combat the illegal marketing of pesticides (Kashmir Observer 29.03.2016). Many of the vegetable terms used today differ from those given in Grierson and Shastri’s (1916) Kashmiri dictionary, and have now been replaced by Urdu terms. Usually, the special marker of the product’s origin, the dēmb, has also been dropped. For instance in Grierson and Shastri, the Kashmiri term for a turnip is ḍēmba gōgaji, but today it is just gōg ji. Kohlrabi, cauliflower, sweet peppers, and tomatoes reached India via Europe in the fifteenth century. Sharma (1983: 133) reports that it was only in 1835 that seed potatoes were introduced by Hügel (1845: 347) and that tomatoes were introduced

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13.

14. 15.

16. 17. 18.

19. 20. 21.

22. 23.

24.

25.

26.

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during the Dogra rule [1846–1947]. All other vegetables cultivated on the lake are of Indian or Asian origin (Vauhan and Geissler 2000). Hāk, also hākh (Elmslie 1872/2007). According to Grierson and Shastri (1916: 157, 217), hākh are “considered a vegetable.” Thus, āram hākh [āram – a kitchen gardener] literally means the “kitchen gardener’s vegetable,” ḍēmb hākh means “vegetable from a raised field” and connotes the green leaves of turnips, and munje hākh the leaves of the kohlrabi. There are some further varieties of hākh that, however, I was not able to differentiate—especially also because different terms are often used for the same vegetable. See also Moorcroft (MS, EU D. 265, p. 73). The cultivation of gourds is very ancient. The Nīlamata Purāṇa (1:122) from the seventh or eighth century a.d. mentions “gourds” as offerings for a sage (Walter Slaje, pers. comm.). For the systematic classification of Indian cucurbits, see Renner and Panday (2013); for their nutritional value, Devaki, Wadikar, and Patki (2015). It can be supposed that the author meant “raised fields” and not the cultivated reed belts. Fazal and Amin (2011: 147, box 1) reported that the transformation of marshy areas into agriculture, orchards, and residential areas had changed from 1009.5 hectares in 1971 to 315 hectares in 2008. The generic term for leafy vegetables is hākh, whereby, for instance, ḍemb hākh indicates the leaves of turnips. This result is close to the estimated total annual yield of eighteen thousand tons given by the APC in 1989. The term and measure puran, which stands for a “yard” in Hindi/Urdu, was introduced to India during the Mughal Empire. In Kashmir, the floating gardens are traditionally measured in purans, whereby one puran is an area measuring two hundred by four or five feet. Only the very poor zamindars who own very little land sell their produce by themselves on the city roadsides. “Estimates by the Directorate in 1989 indicate that the lakes produce 18,000 tons of vegetables a year, valued at 10.8 crore” (ODA 1998: 25). Later, Qadri and Yousuf (2008: 1455) reported that the “‘Dal Dweller’s Zamindar Union’ have furnished the information that vegetables, worth 35 crores are cultivated and supplied every year from the lake on 450 ha of land available for cultivation.” The information on land use on the lake given by Bano (1986) as well as that communicated by Qadri and Yousuf at 417 ha, and 450 ha respectively is similar to Lawrence’s estimates from 1895. It must also be mentioned here that all Kashmiris have access to the Indian ration system providing them with rice, sugar, cooking oil, and kerosene for about one-half the market price. It was only in October 2018 that the J & K High Court finally “directed state government to submit status report on draft action plan for Solid Waste Management (SWM) by laws” (Kashmir Reader 30.10.2018). In 1901 Doughty wrote, “These gardeners are among the most prosperous folk in Kashmir; they have always plenty to eat themselves, and are always certain of good prices for the surplus that they are able to sell” (p. 136).

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27. All vegetables produced on Dal Lake are also cultivated in other parts of the valley (Little 1956: 217).

28. The wild mallow Malva neglecta, with its very high content of vitamin A, is also an important food for the migrating Bakkarwal nomads (Casimir 1991: 178). However, it is also cultivated in the house gardens of Kashmiri villagers in the higher reaches of the Himalayas.

7  The Houseboat Owner Community and the Development of Tourism on Dal Lake The boat is a floating piece of space, a place without a place that exists by itself, that is closed in on itself and at the same time is given over to the infinity of the sea. —Foucault 1984: 9

The Emergence and Evolution of Houseboat Tourism As mentioned before, most of the different types of boat people called Hanjis by the British have slowly vanished—despite having been pivotal for internal commerce. Initially, their importance declined with the introduction of carts and tongas (coaches). This was followed by the construction of the Baramulla–Srinagar and Srinagar–Anantnag roads in about 1890, and the final decline came with the introduction of automobiles in about 1922. However, the development of tourism at the end of the nineteenth century led to the emergence of a new class of “boat people” who began to serve tourists on

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their increasingly comfortable dungas moored along the shores of lakes and rivers. As Mattoo (1988: 128) explained, River transport was a lucrative profession and it always remained in the hands of the “Hānjis.” . . . There were more than 5,700 boats plying in the river Jhelum and its tributaries during the reign of Akbar and Jahāngīr. In his first visit, Akbar wanted to visit the upper division of the valley in a boat and so a large number of beautiful house-boats were afloat on the river Jhelum and the Dal lake. The construction and organisation of this department was assigned to an official called Mīr Baḥarī. It was considered to be a prestigious post. Mullah Maẓḥari a famous poet was appointed by Akbar as Mir Baḥarī of Kashmir.

Since time immemorial, Kashmir and especially the Vale and Srinagar have been a region to which people from all neighboring countries and areas came not only for trade and business but also as members of the different armies that repeatedly occupied the region. Kashmir was always imagined to be a beautiful region, the “paradise on earth” where the ruling classes spent the summer. Under the heading “The Office of Meer Behri1 or Admiralty,” Abu’l Fażl in his Ā’ῑn-i Akbarῑ (1783/2000: 250) already reported: Every part of the empire abounds in boats; but in Bengal [and] Cashmeer . . . they are the center upon which all commerce moves. His majesty has had some pleasure-boats built with convenient apartments, and the head of each is made to resemble some animal. . . . In Cashmeer there was made a model of a ship that astonished everyone who saw it.

Based on this report, some authors have presumed that Akbar was the first to order the construction of luxurious houseboats on Dal Lake, but so-called “joy boats” for tourists and comfortable houseboats started to be constructed only in the late nineteenth century when the valley developed into a place for recreation. The very simple houseboats, called dungas, were still being used in colonial times when the British came to visit Srinagar via Baramullah and Sopore in the northwest of the country. These dungas were large boats with a houselike, mat-thatched hut (Lawrence 1895: 69) in the middle section where passengers were protected from the weather. It was only later that more solid structures were erected. A good description of a dunga is given by Lawrence (1895: 381), when he wrote, This is a flat-bottomed boat, about 50 to 60 feet in length and about 6 feet in width, and draws about 2 feet of water. It has a sloping roof of matting, and side walls of a similar material. The boatmen live in the aft of the dúnga and have their kitchen made of dried clay. The passenger lives in the front part of the boat, and in warm weather life in a dúnga is very pleasant. In the winter, when the passenger traffic is at a standstill, the dúngas are employed in carrying grain. . . . The great impetus lately given to the building of houseboats

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Figure 7.1. British sportsmen: “The way to the hunting grounds.” Source: The Graphic, 9 September, London 1882.

may before long impair the profit of the dúnga-men, and I imagine that the opening of the cart-road from Baramula to Srinagar will also affect injuriously the passenger traffic of the boats.

Isenberg (1970: 92) also described these boats, giving some more details: The doogas in those days were 50–60 feet long, 6–9 feet wide at the center; walled and roofed with reed matting, the roof being of several layers of mat-

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ting and the matting of the wall arranged so that it could be rolled up to form a sort of window opening divided by wooden partitions to form three small rooms with a long pointed deck both fore and aft, and with much storage space throughout under the removable floor boards [see figure 7.1]. When guests were aboard, most of the roofed-portion of the doonga was reserved for them, the entire crew (boat owner, his family, and sometimes hired help too) living and cooking in a small space at the stern, unless the owner kept an additional doonga on behind.2

As increasing numbers of British civil and military servants, travelers, artists, and hunters started coming to Kashmir in the late nineteenth century,3 the boat-building industry began to develop, and over time, the original elementary form of these dungas evolved into a more comfortable means of travel. Already in 1922, C. E. Tyndale Biscoe (1863–1949), who founded a missionary school in Srinagar (the Tyndale Biscoe School) in 1880, wrote (Biscoe 1922: 178) that one of the chief features of the river [ Jhelum] is the increasing number of house-boats, inhabited chiefly by Europeans. As no European is allowed to possess land or build houses in Kashmir, with the exception of a certain number of huts in Gulmarg . . . house-boats become the houses of those who wish to stay in the country. These boats are of all shapes and sizes, from a doonga house-boat to the large barges such as one sees on the Thames, some of them being really beautifully furnished floating houses.

Moreover, Meyer-Illmersdorf (1926: 36), who stayed in Srinagar in about 1920, reports that “already at the 15th of April all rooms [in Srinagar] had been rented out in advance for the whole of the summer and that the rush of tourists was so strong then that the majority of foreigners had to take houseboats.” The “Record of Conversation with Major General Scott, Chief of Staff, Kashmir State Force, 8th October, 1947” (RMGS 1947) reports on the Europeans in Kashmir that the usual summer visitors were leaving, as they normally do at this time of the year, as transport becomes available. [Scott] estimates the number of British residents who normally winter in Kashmir [rose] from three to four hundred. Most of these who normally winter in Kashmir will not leave voluntarily unless they can take all their possessions with them, since they had settled there more or less permanently and own houses, houseboats and other property.

In these years, more and more boat people whose former main occupation was the transport of goods and Kashmiri passengers started to invest in the tourism business and convert their boats to accommodate tourists. These types of simple houseboat can still be seen on the lake or moored at the bank of the Jhelum (image 7.1). They are inhabited by poorer families who work in Srinagar, and in the middle of the twentieth century, they were also rented out to foreign tourists, mainly to backpackers.

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Image 7.1. Simple dunga houseboats on the Jhelum River on which poorer families live. Photo by the author.

Through competition for clients, houseboat owners began to equip the boats with better facilities and more attractive décor in the early twentieth century (images 7.2 and 7.3, figure 7.2) as described accurately by Khan (1978: 74–75): In the beginning, visitors brought along with them all their own paraphernalia and servants. In those days the doonga was for the visitor “not much more than a good serviceable tent on the move.” But gradually the versatile Hanji realized the importance of his boat. The business-wise boatman now began to care much for his guests. With the passage of time, he supplied more and more comfort such as a bath tub, wicker and canvas chairs, wicker tea tables, and crockery, while the traveler continued to bring his own camp bed, silverware, linen, cooking utensils and comforts. The doonga then developed from a small craft into a relatively spacious boat 85 feet long and 8 or 9 feet wide at the center); from three tiny to five good size rooms; from reed mat roof and walls to shingled roof and sturdy wood plank walls. The doonga’s function as mobile living quarters for visiting foreigners changed in emphasis with the innovation of the modern type of houseboat.4

Over the years, as more and more visitors came to Kashmir, wealthy businessmen from the city as well as landowners also invested in the tourist business. More houseboats were constructed and then moored on the Jhelum or lined up along the southern and western edge of Dal Lake’s swamps and islands.

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Image 7.2. A “doonga houseboat” hosting tourists on the Dal Lake (about 1920). Source: Meyer-Illmersdorf 1926.

When the tourist and transport business boomed, some owners of simple mat-thatched boats who had saved some money also invested in a dunga; and later, as they became richer, they acquired better furnished houseboats. As one of my informants told me, My great-grandfather, like all the members of the family before, used to live on very simple boats. But when they, due to the growing demand for transport, had earned some good money, they acquired a dunga. Then, over time and with growing affluence, my grandfather could buy a good houseboat that was moored on Dal Lake. In about 1965, the now bigger family consisting of three brothers with their families split, acquired houseboats, and settled at the southern shore of the Nageen Lake where we still stay. (M. D. 12.08.2009)

Tourist Houseboats from the Early Twentieth Century to Today Where there had been openness in 1962 there was now [1989] a long row of houseboats, each with its signboard and steps; and some of the boats seemed to be linked by a railed timber walk, supported on stilts. . . . Forty years before, you could drink water from the lake (and I remembered people in excursion boats even in 1962 using lake water to make the special Kashmiri tea). Now Aziz said, and Mr. Butt shook his head in agreement, the flush system of some houseboats emptied directly into the lake. —Naipaul 1990: 496, 502

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Image 7.3. Entrance of a “doong houseboat” for tourists in the early twentieth century. Source: Petrocokino 1920.

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Figure 7.2. Houseboat life in Kashmir . . . on the Thelum [ Jhelum] River. Source: The Graphic, 8 August, London 1891.

Most authors agree that construction of the first luxurious and more elaborate houseboats was ordered in 1888 by a certain British man named Martyn T. Kennard (Kalla 1996: 9–10, Khan 1978: 75), who had seen the large houseboats found in Bengal. Others claim, as mentioned above, that it was Akbar who had ordered some well-built boats and that Kennard and others had only improved them. Younghusband (1933/1909: 44) remarked that Srinagar is the central starting-point for all expeditions. Here house-boats, dunga-boats, camp equipage, and all the paraphernalia of Kashmir travels may be obtained, and shikaris and servants engaged. House-boats are not indigenous to Kashmir. They were introduced by Mr. M. T. Kennard in 1888, but now they may be numbered by hundreds. Some are permanently occupied by Europeans, who live in them nearly the whole year round for years together, but most are let out for the season.

During World War II, the houseboat industry reached a new height “when thousands of military personnel from all over south and east Asia spent their furloughs in Srinagar” (Khan 1978: 76). Over the years, these swimming hotels became more numerous and even more elaborate (Kaul 1957). They had

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comfortable living rooms, bedrooms, and bathrooms,5 not much different from those to be seen lined up on the Dal (image 7.4) and Nageen Lakes today. This was the time when a new community came into being, as Isenberg (1970: 96) pointed out: Their houseboat specialisation had several decades ago created a distinctly new boatman community. There is no doubt that the way of life of houseboat families is more progressive than that of other boatmen of Srinagar; that they, before other boatmen, began to live in clean, relatively uncrowded airy doongas, to wear western-style jackets and trousers, to buy or rent bicycles, to send their sons to government schools, to have all children vaccinated against smallpox, to use thermometers during illness, to boil drinking water at least during epidemics, to establish bank accounts, to use electric ceiling lights in the doongas.

At the beginning of the last century, only about two hundred boats serving tourists were moored on Dal and Nageen Lakes. But then, in order to accommodate the growing number of tourists, more boats were built so that their number had grown from 250 to 775 in 1987 (Trisal 1987: 47). Regarding ownership, it is said that at the end of the twentieth century, 440 households owned only a single boat, 110 households owned two boats, and 17 households owned three boats. There were also some households that owned even more (DPR 2000, II,1: 248, tables 9 and 10). Wealthy citizens had been investing in the houseboat business since about the middle of the 1900s, and,

Image 7.4. Modern houseboats lined up in the southern part of Dal Lake. Photo by the author.

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according to my informants, they now own some 20 to 30 percent of all boats. Comparable to the “absent landlord” in an agrarian society, the boat is a profitable investment for the owner who, in the tourist season, pays only about 2,000 rupees per month to a cook and 1,500 rupees to usually one or two other employees (DRP 2000: vol. 2, part 1, p. 248). In a good year, the owner’s income can be very high, because, regardless of how many guests he accommodates, he only has to pay an annual tax of 2,500 rupees to the “Houseboat Owner’s Association” (HBO), which then transfers this money to the government. The design of these houseboats is not much different from those being built around 1930. However, they have become larger (images 7.5 and 7.6; figure 7.3), with three and sometimes four bedrooms and even more elaborate furnishings. Now all boats have a large living room with a big dining table (image 7.7), as well as bedrooms (image 7.8) equipped with small en suite bathrooms. Many houseboats provide a shaded platform on the roof, and all have a small veranda-like platform at the boat’s stern with some steps down to the water level where shikaras, the gondola-like water taxies, can berth. In former times, a small dunga was attached to the houseboat, providing both a home and kitchen for the boatmen’s families who served the tourists (Luthra 1953: 208). Today, this is rarely seen. Now, a wooden planked bridge usually leads from the bow of the boat to a small house on stilts, where the boat owner’s family or the hired family lives and prepares meals for the tourists (image 7.5).6

Image 7.5. A comfortable houseboat with attached pile-constructed house. Photo by the author.

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Figure 7.3. Ground plan of an upper-class houseboat. Figure by the author.

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Image 7.6. A luxurious “deluxe” class houseboat on the Nageen Lake. Photo by the author.

Image 7.7. The living room in an upper-class houseboat. Photo by the author.

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Image 7.8. A bedroom in an upper-class houseboat. Photo by the author.

The Risky Economy of Houseboat Tourism Unlike the lake gardeners, who participate almost completely in a subsistence economy through ownership of land and lotus gardens along with the fabrication of floating gardens, the houseboat owners’ economy depends completely on the unpredictable fluctuations in the number of tourists visiting Kashmir. Tourist business on the lake is seasonal, and winter and early spring is always a lean period in which houseboat owners have to survive with the money earned in the summer and early autumn months. Figure 7.4 gives a general impression of the periodicity of tourism in Kashmir as registered at Srinagar airport. Not all tourists coming to Kashmir spend any time on a houseboat, and they rarely stay longer than two days. On these days, they hire a shikara to explore the lake and visit the famous Moghul gardens not far from the northeastern banks of the Dal. They then leave for other places in the valley or for Ladakh.

Houseboat Tourism in Times of Unrest The number of tourists staying on houseboats in the tourist season is especially unpredictable due to the often insecure situation in Kashmir due to

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Figure 7.4. Periodicity of tourists coming to Kashmir registered at Srinagar airport. Source: Department of Tourism and Planning, Srinagar. Figure by the author.

political unrest or weather calamities (such as the big flood in September 2014). This causes tremendous problems for the families of houseboat owners. Many tourist seasons fail completely due to militant unrest, as happened from the late 1980s until the late 1990s, when there was great suffering in Kashmir and thousands lost their lives. In this period, tourism came to an almost complete standstill, and it is estimated that the state lost 27 million tourists from 1989 to 2002, leading to a revenue loss of $3.6 billion (Bhat and Khan 2014: 3). As Figures 7.5a and 7.5b show, the average number of 400,000 to 600,000 Indian visitors per year dropped to an average of only 2,240 (min. = 322, max. = 7,027). However, the number of foreign tourists that had always reached some 40,000 to 60,000 in good years remained remarkably stable, but on a low level with an average of 7,863 (min. = 4,627, max. = 9,592). The reason for the higher influx of foreigners was that tourists from India, especially Hindus, were thought to be a special target of terrorist attacks. The distribution pattern of tourists staying on houseboats relates to but does not match the general influx of tourists into the state (figure 7.4). Differences in monthly sojourns on boats relate mainly to the school holidays (first peak) in India when large families come with their children. Bearing in mind that tourists usually spend only a few nights on a boat and that there are some six hundred houseboats on Dal and Nageen Lakes, the roughly ten thousand tourists per year in times of unrest was not enough for house-

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Figure 7.5a, b. Number of Indian tourists visiting Kashmir in the years 1975 to 2002 and Number of foreign tourists visiting Kashmir in the years 1975 to 2002. Graph by the author. Source: Department of Tourism and Planning, Srinagar.

boat owners to ride out the crisis. In these years, many houseboat owners who had no relatives in the city or in the villages to help them were hardly able even to feed their children (for details, see Bhat and Khan 2014), and one houseboat owner told me that his family only survived with the help of European ex-tourists who had sent some money. Also, because there are usually no ties between the community of Sunni houseboat owners and the Shia market gardeners, the latter rarely helped them. In 2005, with increasing pacification, there was hope that Kashmir would become a “paradise again” (The Independent 29.06.2009), and, in fact, after years of turmoil, the number of tourists staying on houseboats grew slowly from 2005 to 2013 (figure 7.6). Nonetheless, this was only a short respite, and after the devastating flood in September 2014, there was once again only a slow growth in the number of tourists coming to Kashmir in the following years.

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Figure 7.6. Annual number of tourists staying on one houseboat from 2005 to 2017. Figure and data by the author. Note: The figure shows the slow growth in numbers due to the ongoing pacification after years of unrest, and how houseboat tourism again recovered only slowly after the devastating flood in September 2014.

Broadening the Economic Base Trekking Tours To overcome the disadvantageously short period of lake tourism between April and October, the houseboat owners have always tried to broaden their economic base by seeking additional sources of income. For some years now, many boat owners have cooperated with trekking tour organizations in Srinagar and hotel owners in both the valley and Ladakh. This collaboration intensified especially after the long period of militancy in the 1980s and 1990s, with some boat owners even trying to organize such tours by themselves. Those who could afford it bought or took a bank loan to buy offroad vehicles, and some houseboat owners put their money together to buy a vehicle that they then shared to bring tourists to the different resorts and scenic places in the valley and in Ladakh.

On Lake Peddlers, Mobile Phones, and Commissions It is not just houseboat owners who depend on large numbers of tourists visiting the lake. The same also holds for the thousands of people associated with

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the tourist business, such as the shikara-peddlers, the manufacturers of the different Kashmiri crafts,7 and souvenir vendors. Alongside the money houseboat owners can earn through organizing trekking and other tours for tourists, they can also earn auxiliary income from their relations with the different types of peddlers who sell Kashmiri handicrafts and other souvenirs to the guests on the boats. Whereas the hotel owner in the countryside pays a commission to a boat owner who sends or brings tourists, the peddlers who come and sell their goods to tourists generally pay a commission to the boat owner. Before 1980, peddlers had to find out by themselves whether new guests had arrived at a houseboat so that they could become the first to supply their goods. Although different peddlers had a more or less defined “territory” on Dal and/or Nageen Lake, there was still some competition between them. However, as mobile phones were allowed and introduced in Kashmir in the late 1980s, houseboat owners could utilize this new tool and call specific peddlers whenever new tourists come. This enabled peddlers to reduce their transaction costs and the houseboat owner to secure his commission of 5 to 10 percent on the goods sold—an amount the peddler had already added to his price. Commissions are sometimes also taken when more expensive goods are bought or when, for instance, a tourist has a suit tailored in Srinagar. Then the owner of the houseboat can tell the shopkeeper or tailor that he has sent the tourists to the shop and is therefore owed some money. As a result, shopkeepers usually inform tourists that they are not willing to bring the items purchased to the houseboat, because this will oblige them to pay a commission not only to the owner of the houseboat but also to the shikara man who delivers them. Next to the peddlers who bring carved wooden (walnut) objects, saffron, jewelry, and flowers; those who sell cold drinks, cigarettes, biscuits, and other snacks; and those who take pictures of tourist couples dressed as “Kashmiri princes and princesses” (image 7.9), the most important professions typical for the valley are those who make crafts such as Kashmiri shawls, and those who make papier-mâché and lacquered objects. The following paragraphs describe the origin of these Kashmiri crafts and the production of the most important ones sold on the lake.

Crafts As Pal (2007: 175) explained, nobody knows exactly when the manufacture of different crafts was taken up in Kashmir. None of the items so typical for Kashmir today are known from collections and museums to have originated from before the seventeenth century. Nonetheless, some say that these products were already introduced by the first Iranian or Central Asian artists who came to Kashmir as craftsmen with Mir Ali Hamadani in the late fourteenth

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Image 7.9. Taking pictures of tourists dressed up as a “Kashmiri prince and princess.” Photo by the author.

century. But it is generally assumed, as reported in the Bahāristān-i-Shāhῑ (11.6, see also Pandit 1991: 64), that it was Zain-ul-Abidin (1418–70) who made great efforts to develop and advance his kingdom by encouraging artists and craftsmen to come and settle in Kashmir. He introduced bookbinding; the production of silk, paper, glass, and papier-mâché; carpet weaving; and pen case making. At the same time, weavers from Central Asia and Iran started coming to Kashmir and manufacturing the shawls for which Kashmir is still famous (Khan 1986: 189–90). In the Tarikh-i-Rashidi, Mīrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt (1996: 262) noted that Zaynul’abidin . . . reigned for fifty years. He caused Kashmir to flourish. . . . During his time Kashmir became urbanized. . . . Many types of craftsmen and artisans one rarely comes across in most cities are plentiful in Kashmir, like stone-polishers, stone-carvers, glass-blowers, glazers, goldsmiths, etc. This is all due to Sultan Zaynul’abidin’s efforts [see, also Bahāristān-i-Shāhῑ 1991: 64].

One of the earliest accounts of the different crafts so typical for Kashmir can be found in Francois Bernier’s (1891: 402) report on his visit to Kashmir in about 1660 during the reign of Emperor Aurangzeb. Bernier wrote about the Kashmiris: They are also very active and industrious. The workmanship and beauty of their . . . bedsteads, trunks, inkstands, boxes, spoons, and various other things are quite remarkable, and articles of the manufacture are in use in every part of the Indies. They perfectly understand the art of varnishing, and are evi-

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dently skillful in closely imitating the beautiful veins of a certain wood, by inlaying with gold threads so delicately wrought that I never saw anything more elegant or perfect.

Over time, Srinagar became an important location for manufacturing and trading in different goods, and crafts are still especially typical for the city. In the late nineteenth century, factories were producing more and more cashmere shawls, both cheap and expensive versions; painted, carved, or lacquered objects from wood; papier-mâché items; and carpets—not only for export but also for the tourists visiting the valley. Here again, like the divide between the Sunni houseboat owners and the mainly Shia market gardeners, there is a divide between the different types of craftspeople: whereas the woodcarvers and jewelers are usually Sunnis, the carpet and shawl weavers and those who manufacture papier-mâché and lacquered objects are Shiites. This once more indicates that carving wood and making jewelry are very old arts. They were introduced mainly by Shia Iranian artisans,8 and it is only in recent years that some Sunnis have also started to work in the Shia-owned factories. Today, alongside the different objects carved from walnut wood, from simple bowls and animal figures to delicately ornamented dining tables and chairs, the main items brought to the houseboats are (next to saffron and some consumer goods) jewelry—namely, rings, bracelets, and chains with lockets mainly set with semiprecious stones, some from Ladakh but mostly from Rajasthan and Gujarat (image 7.10). Of all the different crafts for which

Image 7.10. Displaying and selling jewelry to a tourist family on a houseboat. Photo by the author.

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Kashmir is famous (see Lawrence 1895: 375–80; Pal 2007), the following will mention only those products that are sold mainly to the tourists by peddlers, making them, via the commission system, part of the houseboat owner’s economy. These different crafts are brought by shikara-like boats rowed either by a relative of the manufacturer of the objects or by a hired member of a Demb Hanz family.9

Kashmir Shawls and Carpets The hypothesis that knowledge about manufacturing shawls originated in Iran or neighboring countries in today’s Central Asia is corroborated by the history of cultural relations between Kashmir and these countries. These go back to ancient times, when weaving was a tradition in these regions long before it appeared in the valley. Regardless of when shawl weaving was first introduced to Kashmir, it can be stated unerringly that in the time of Akbar (1542–1605) there were already two thousand factories producing them in the country. In the time of the Sultans, Kashmir shawls were exported on a large scale to many countries in the world (Hasan 1959: 247–48) by Iranian Shiites who had their own colony in Srinagar (Sharma 1983: 87). In this time, Kashmir was mainly known for its famous shawls of different types and qualities that were exported throughout the Western world (Ames 2007; Lévi-Strauss 1991; Maskiell 2002; Sharma 1983: 163–64). Mountstuart Elphinstone (1815/1972: 2:240) who visited the valley in about 1810, spoke about the “remarkable production of Cashmeer shawls which supply the whole world, and which are said to be manufactured at sixteen thousand looms, each of which gives employment to three men”; and Moorcroft and Trebeck (1837/1976: 2:123) even reported that, in the late 1820s, “it is said that one hundred and twenty thousand people are employed in the shawl manufacture and that this is the chief employment of the population.”10 The different types of shawl are made from the fine undercoat hair of the mountain goat, the Changtangi goat (Capra hircus laniger) from the higher ranges of the Himalayas are called “cashmere.” The better shawls, made from even thinner goat hair, are called pashmina. The finest and most expensive shawls, however, which are called shahtoosh, are made from the hair of the Himalayan antelope, the chiru (Pantholops hodgesonii). The expensive shawls—the pashmina and the extremely valuable shahtoosh—are ornamented with beautiful broad and extremely fine-stitched borders, usually with a more or less abstract floral pattern. They often come with a big central medallion that may cover the whole fabric ( Jaitly and Sahai 1990: 35–57; Lévi-Strauss 1991).

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After the major famine of 1831, many poor weavers fled the valley, and as von Hügel (1835: 349) wrote, The emigration has brought to the Panjáb and Hindustán many shawl manufacturers; and Kashmìr will, most likely, never yield again what it did a few years ago. Núrpur, Lud’yána, and many other places can bring to the market shawls cheaper than Kashmír, where every article of food is dearer than in the Panjáb and Hindustán.

The subsequent famine of 1877 to 1879 gave a final deathblow to the shawl industry and to the weavers who had always formed the poorest strata of society. The 5,148 weavers who had survived, according to the city census of 1891, fled to the villages, where they worked for starvation wages. As a result, Lawrence (1895: 375) could state in the late nineteenth century that “the shawl industry is now unfortunately a tradition—a memory of the past.”11 Since about the end of the sixteenth century, Kashmiri weavers use a socalled talim. Written on long stretches of paper and fixed on the warp, the different symbols indicate the exact position and color of a thread for a shawl or a knot for a carpet (image 7.11). It is said, they were specially invented

Image 7.11. A traditional talim from Kashmir. Photo by the author. Note: The different symbols indicate the exact position and color of a thread for a shawl or a knot for a carpet.

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for the weaving of kani shawls, a method then also employed for weaving carpets.12 Sir Richard Temple (1887: 2:46–47) described the production of such talims as follows: Upstairs we saw the patterns being made. The pattern [of the shawl] is first drawn on paper; than a master workman puts it under some open threadwork, which is thus partly transparent, so that he can see it underneath. Than with needle and thread he works it on to the thread-work, which serves as a foundation. . . . Another man takes the pattern, and reads it out for others collected for this purpose: so many red threads, so many blue, and so many yellow, and so on. They all write it down at the same time from his dictation. Thus, as it were, scores are written out, and placed before the workmen below, and each workman, looking at his score, works in the threads accordingly with his loom [see also, Ames, 1997, 2007; Harris 2000; Temple 1887: 1:299; and for a detailed analysis, Leitner 1882].

Papier-Mâché and Lacquered Objects The production of lacquered objects, one of the most important crafts and trades, was also introduced from Iran and/or Central Asia ( Jaitly and Sahai 1990: 121–37). These objects are not only exported throughout the world but also always offered to houseboat tourists. They are made either from wood (for instance, the different types of boxes), or from papier-mâché (such as the various types of vases, bowls, and lamp bodies). Temple (1887: 1:300–301) described the process as follows: The papier mâché was familiar to all Europeans in appearance, and is produced by pulping and molding coarse “country paper,” and then painting and varnishing it. The varnish is produced by boiling clear copal (sundras) in pure turpentine, and is absolutely transparent. This system of painting and varnishing is by no means confined to papier mâché, but is frequently applied to woodwork on a large scale.

Even today, the fabrication of lacquered papier-mâché objects is a complex step-by-step procedure. First of all, the mold is made by a potter. The papier-mâché is made from wet paper pulp mixed with wallpaper glue that is then minced to a paste. This is applied to the mold. It is then dried and cut off from the mold into parts that are then glued together again. The object is smoothed off and the edges are removed before it is covered with two to three layers of varnish. It is only then, after the layers are dry, that the different delicate patterns are applied with a fine brush. These last two steps, the varnishing and application of designs, are the same as those applied to wooden objects (images 7.12a, b). The majority of lacquered objects are exported, but a certain quantity is sold to tourists on the houseboats (image 7.13).

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Image 7.12a, b. The final application of a floral design on a box lid. Photos by the author.

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Image 7.13. Displaying lacquered objects to a tourist on the veranda of a houseboat. Photo by the author.

The following figure 7.7 depicts the economic dependency of the houseboat owners on tourism and their affiliations with the market in Srinagar. It also shows the relations between the tourist industry and the origin of the merchandise brought to tourists by peddlers.

Marriage, Inheritance, and Selling Boats among Houseboat Owners Marriage: “We Marry Only in Our Community” Generally, Sunni–Shia marriages are not extremely rare in Kashmir—either among the city dwellers or between the market gardeners and the Gad Hanz. However, in the latter case, due to the Gad Hanz’s low position in the social hierarchy, a fisherman’s daughter may sometimes marry into a market gardener’s family, but it is said that a gardener would never give his daughter to a fisherman groom. Among houseboat owners, mixed marriages never occur. As one informant said in this context, “We only marry in our community.” Here, marriage partners stem mainly from the community of Sunni owners of houseboats, and, here as well, marriages between the same zāt are preferred. One would expect that because most if not all Sunni zāt found among the five to six hundred families of houseboat owners are also very common in Srinagar,

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Figure 7.7. Dependence of the houseboat owner’s family on tourists and the market. Figure by the author. Note: The figure also shows the relationship between peddlers and tourists and the origin of their merchandise.

marriage relations between them should occur. But, as they themselves reported, the Sunnis from the city do not want to give their daughters to a houseboat family. There are several reasons for this. First, this reluctance is due to the houseboats accommodating non-Muslim tourists. Their concerns relate, on the one hand, to Hindus from India but, more importantly, to foreigners from Western countries who often behave in ways that are abhorrent to most Muslims (drinking alcohol, smoking hashish, and dressing indecently—particularly the women). Second, it still relates to the old bias assigning a bad reputation to all “boat people,” claiming that they are quarrelsome and bad-mannered. Third, city dwellers would not expect their daughters to endure the hard life on a houseboat, especially in winter. These reasons, together with the inheritance rule of never selling a houseboat to a Shia, lead to the group forming a close-knit community with distinct Sunni endogamy and occupationally determined marriages. On the other hand, houseboat owners like to marry their daughters to city dwellers, especially if the family of the groom owns a house in which the girl and possibly also her family can spend the hard and lean winter period.

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Figure 7.8. Marriage relations in three houseboat owner’s families. Figure by the author.

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The three kinship charts (figure 7.8) show that the majority of marriages took place between houseboat owner families. On average, 60 percent of all forty marriages registered took place between sons and daughters of houseboat owners. The exceptions relate in two cases to brides from abroad (Australia, United Kingdom), and in only nine (3.5 percent) did the marriage partner come from a non-houseboat-owner family. As said, zāt endogamy is preferential, but because of the low probability of finding a suitable marriage partner in their own zāt in the relatively small houseboat owner community, inter-zāt marriages do occur. Also, as with the market gardeners, even if a marriage partner from the same zāt is available, this preference is sometimes overruled by the prestige and wealth of the bride’s family.13

Inheritance As in most Islamic societies and in line with the Quran, it is also the sons (usually the firstborn) who inherit property among the houseboat owners’ community, whereas the daughters marry out. If there is more than one son, with his family one brother will stay and work on the boat. Whether two or more brothers stay depends on the economic situation of the family and the relationship between the brothers. If only one brother stays on the boat the other brother(s) are then paid off after estimating the value of the boat, and the respective percentage of the amount is given to them. This also implies that, in future, sons who leave home have no share in the remaining family or its income. Also, the younger, yet-unmarried brothers will stay with the inheritor on the houseboat until they can marry out, preferably into a houseboat owner’s family with only one daughter and no sons.

Selling a Boat: “The Houseboats Will Always Stay in Our Community” The marriage and inheritance rules, which both result in the community of houseboat owners continuing to be a close-knit Sunni community, are also reflected in the rule “never to sell a houseboat to a Shia.” When I asked why there are no Shia owners of houseboats, the answer was usually twofold. I was first told that “the Shia people are too poor, and thus they cannot afford to buy a houseboat.” But when I remarked that everybody knows that there are extremely rich zamῑndārs and then asked whether a boat owner in need would sell his boat to such a rich Shia, the answer was usually just “no.” Pressing further, I inquired what would happen if a Shia were to offer much more money than a prospective Sunni buyer would, the answer again was a “no”—finally followed by the statement: “The houseboats will always stay in our [Sunni] community!”

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Notes 1. Lawrence (1895: 345) also used the term “Mirbahri people” (see also chapter 3):

2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

7. 8.

9.

10.

11. 12.

13.

“But apart from the splendid produce of the rádh and the demb lands, the cultivators of the Dal lake—the Mirbahri people, as they are called in Kashmír—have other sources of food.” More descriptions and images of simple dungas and those arranged especially for tourists are published in Heiland (1937: 66–69) and Pirie (1909: 231–34). Temple (1887: 122 fn.) reported that “the real figures for 1871 were 331 visitors, including families; in all 472 persons.” For a good description of the early dungas, see Petrocokino (1920: 3–6). A good account of life on a houseboat on the Dal in those days can be found in the novel King fishers Catch Fire by Rumer Godden (1953). The houseboats are officially ranked according to their facilities. In the highest class, the so-called “Deluxe Category” for instance, a room (with two, sometimes three beds) costs 3,720 rupees—4,800 rupees if breakfast and dinner are included. Lower categories cost less money. Many of the crafts manufactured in Kashmir are also exported to India, the United States, and Europe. When discussing the introduction of Persian as the general language and the absorption of many such skills in the fabrication of new products, which all came from Central Asia and Persia, Rafiqi (1977: 223–34) spoke about a “change . . . from the ancient Hindu system to a Persianized form of Muslim Society: and culturally Kashmir became part of the Iraniān world, looking to Central Asia and Persia.” All products sold on the lake to houseboat owners or Demb Hanz but not to tourists, such as kitchen utensils, plastic containers, or cloth for tailoring, are offered mainly by men who receive the products on commission, or, in rare cases, acquire them from a wholesaler and sell them on their own account. For a detailed description of the manufacture and trade in different types of shawls in the early nineteenth century, see Moorcroft and Trebeck (1937/1977: 2:164–97; Rizvi 1999: 50–68). All “Kashmir shawls” sold to the tourists on the lake are imported mainly from Punjab and are of inferior quality. The important manufacturing and trading in carpets is not described here, because these are produced mainly for export and rarely sold to houseboat tourists via peddlers. Usually a dowry is paid. Among the middle class, this comprises about 15–20 lakh rupees (1 lakh = 100,000 rupees). However, it is the marriage celebrations that are the most costly.

8  The Gad Hanz The Last Fishers on the Dal The Passing Art of Fishing From ancient times until the mid-twentieth century, the Gad Hanz,1 the fishers on the Dal and other Kashmiri lakes, occupied an important economic niche. Nonetheless, the classic texts provide hardly any information on these communities. Only the tenth-century Mokṣopāya (MU.1.20.21) and the fifteenth-century Pseudo-Jonarāja ([Ps-]JRT.B 726) report that fishers in Kashmir use lines and hooks to catch their fish, while the seventeenthcentury Bhāskarakaṇṭha (a commentary to MU) mentions that as well as using other types of bait, the fishers put rice on their hooks.2 Surely, as Mohan (1981: 253–25) wrote, fish have always been an important food in Kashmir. For example, KRT (7:522) states, “Though he [King Kakaśa, 1063– 1089] disported himself daily with many women, his strength did not fail him, on account of (the use of ) fish-broth and other aphrodisiacs.” Most fishing families used to live on their dungas. Over the last one hundred years, however, they have gradually settled down on land mainly near Dhobi Gath (Dar Mohallah, see image 8.1) in the northeast (Sidiq-Dag Mohallah) or near Dal Gate. Until about the beginning of the twentieth century, as Lawrence (1895: 157–60) noted, fishers engaged mainly in long-line fishing and used different types of nets (zāl, jāl*). The latter come in three types with different mesh sizes. Cast nets and, in former times, also dip nets (image 8.2) are used to catch very small species (about four to five centimeters long), whereas nets with a slightly larger mesh are used to catch fish

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Image 8.1. A traditional fisher settlement on the northeastern shore of Dal Lake. Photo by the author.

Image 8.2. Throwing the cast net to catch small and medium-sized species. Photo by the author.

measuring circa twelve to fifteen centimeters.3 These small fish4 are dried on metal sheets or on nets (image 8.3). They are then sold in the market either dried as hōkh (dried) gāḍ or smoked as phari gāḍa, and they are eaten fried or together with vegetables.

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Image 8.3a, b. Drying small fish in the sun to be sold in the market. Photos by the author.

Previously, bigger species were caught using large-mesh nets. Nowadays, however, these bigger fish are caught mainly with long lines. Also, due to the general depletion of bigger fish in the Dal, fish are also bought in from other places—as will be seen later—kept in buckets, and sold live by the

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fisherwomen mainly on the different bridges and next to the Friday Mosque in Srinagar. Some decades ago, Dal Lake fishers also smoked bigger fish: they covered them with layers of different types of moist reeds that, when torched, produced the necessary smoke. Nowadays, however—I am told—this method is mainly used only by some poor families fishing in Anchar Lake. Today, next to rod fishing (bislaῑ), which is also often practiced by the market gardeners and some city dwellers, most fishing on the Dal is done with a long line. The use of cast nets, of which eight different types of varying length were still in use in the 1970s (Sunder et al. 1978), is rarely seen today. Since ancient times and still today, both fishers and many market gardeners use a harpoon (nāruṭsh) to catch bigger species (image 8.4). Whereas the only fish that can still be harpooned are carp, at the beginning of the twentieth century, the golden mahseer (Tor putitora, Cyprininae), which can reach a length of 2.7 meters and a weight of 54 kilograms, was still common in the Dal and especially in the Jhelum (Lawrence 1929: 126). Until about the first decades of the twentieth century, most fisher families could still earn a living from their traditional work. The men caught the fish, and the women sold them in the market while also harvesting the leaves of water lilies and other plants to sell as fodder for the cows and small livestock of gardeners and other families living on or near the Dal. Even in 1989, Atkins Planning Consultants still reported that

Image 8.4. The harpoon (nāruṭsh) used to catch big fish—nowadays mainly carp. Photo by the author.

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Kashmir is an important area for fresh water fishing and accounts for nearly all the fish landed in J & K State. The digest of Statistics 1985–6 gives a total of 10,000 tons of fish caught in Kashmir for that year, two thirds are mirror carps, nearly one third are Schizothorax (commonly known as Kashmiri fish). . . . Although the Schizothorax fish has been somewhat affected by pollution, especially through excessive silt, penetrating the breeding areas, the mirror carp has prospered since its introduction to Kashmir in 1955. In both cases the quantities landed each year have continued to increase as have numbers of licensed fishermen. Dal Lake is an important fishing ground accounting for 15 percent (1,500 tons a year) of the fish caught in the valley; fishing is not allowed on Nagin Lake. Using the Directorate of Fisheries estimates, the annual gross income received by Dal Lake fishermen is of the order of Rs 2.25 crores. (ODA 1989: 25–26)

Fishing for Jobs As mentioned in the quote above, the declining fish population due to pollution had already been noticed at the end of the twentieth century. This ongoing degradation of the Dal reduced the fish population more and more, so that, for instance, on 6 August 2012, the drastic reduction in oxygen, fluctuations in temperature, and untreated sewage resulted in a massive death of fish in Nageen Lake. Whereas some of the small species5 are still abundant, the once very common, much favored, and most important species—the locally called al-gaḍ, or koshur gaḍ (Schizothorax niger6)—has become extremely rare. The other reason for the decline in the endemic fish population was the introduction to the Dal in 1955 of both the common and the mirror carp (Cyprinus carpio communis and C. carpio specularis), both called Panjabi gaḍ (Sehgal 1999). These fish spread quickly throughout the Kashmir lakes and slow-flowing rivers, ousting the once abundant Schizothorax, as reported by Das and Subla (1970) and also Shafi et al.7 In the following years, the carp population grew to such an extent that it is “now the most abundant species in the lakes, rivers and streams, overshadowing almost all the original species of the valley” (Das and Subla 1963: 92). This drastic increase in Dal Lake’s carp population is confirmed by Sunder et al. (1978), who reported that in the years between 1969 and 1971 these species contributed between 52.3 and 73.2 percent of the total catch. Again, ten years later, Fida et al. (1988) reported that 70 to 75 percent of the fish caught were carp. In the same period, however, as reported by Sunder et al. (1978), the snow trout Schizothorax declined to amounts between 4.0 and 15.0 percent of the catch. Nonetheless, in the years 1980 to 1981, 253.5 tons of Schizothorax were still being caught in Dal Lake; but in roughly the same period (1983–84), 105.3

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tons of carp were already being landed per year. In 2009 to 2010, the catch of carp grew to 401.92 tons, whereas the catch of Schizothorax went down to only 23.1 tons in the years 2007–8 (Qureshi et al. 2016: 1498–99). Nowadays, there are just five fisher settlements left on the lake, and Wani et al. (2013: 103) have reported, quoting LAWDA, that there are currently only 250 fisher families living around Dal Lake. However, my informants estimate that the real figure is actually only 120 to 150 families. Back in 2006, Wani and Dana published a survey of fisherwomen on the Dal that highlighted their socioeconomic problems. From three hundred fisher families, they interviewed ninety women who were engaged in different fishing activities, mainly in selling the catch. They reported that the women’s main problem was their low income due largely to the malpractices of middlemen and the distance between their homes and the market. They suggested setting up a fish market near the Dal basin. They also complained that the government did not provide them with financial assistance to help pay for the very expensive net material and nets. They did not mention a decline in the fish population as a problem. Indeed, the data collected in the following years, between 2010 and 2015 (figure 8.1) show that the total fish catch in the Dal actually went up. According to the Department of Fisheries (Srinagar), the annual catch in this period increased from about 320 to 500 tons, and it can be assumed that this was mostly carp. As a result, Qureshi et al. (2016: 1504) proposed that special care needs to be given to ensure a sustainable and growing stock of the local species and lowering of carp fish productivity, Carp culture could be promoted as a separate freshwater aquaculture activity in other derelict water bodies, which would yield good income and keep the supply chain of fish to

Figure 8.1. The total weight of fish (tons) caught in Dal Lake in the years 2010 to 2015. Source: Office of the Chief Project Officer Fisheries. Srinagar, Government of J&K.

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the market. The restauration of Schizothorax fishery in the lakes of Kashmir will ensure growth in socio-economic and cultural terms and sustainability of balanced fishery.

As reported above, nowadays it is mainly long-line fishing that is used to catch the bigger species, whereas cast nets are still sometimes used to catch the small fish for drying. However, most men now work in Srinagar as laborers or taxi drivers or they do public work organized for them by the municipality. Many also earn their living as plumbers, carpenters, or electricians, who then also work for the houseboat owners (figure 8.2). Wani et al. (2013: 103) reported that “the catching practice is completed mostly before dawn and is accomplished by men folk, which allows them to exploit other economic opportunities.” When talking with gardeners or houseboat owners about the economic situation of the Gad Hanz, I was usually told that they are actually quite rich and some even own bus lines. They say that the reason why fishers still live in their ramshackle houses (see image 8.1) is to create an impression of poverty so that they will be recognized as a “scheduled caste” and thereby be awarded the “backward certificate” and “ration card,” which entitle them to obtain mainly rice, cooking oil, and sugar at less than half of the market price. However, I was unable to verify this information. In my discussions with fishers, I was always told that they live only from fishing and that they are very poor, mainly because of the decreasing fish population. This is

Figure 8.2. The present economic situation of the Dal fishers. Figure by the author.

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partly verified by the DRP’s (2000: 1:266) report that fishers are the poorest community among all the occupational groups on the Dal with an average income of 1,979.16 rupees per month.

Resettlement In 2000, the people living at the Sidiq-Dag Mohalla site that had encroached into the open water of the Dal (see map 5.1, Mohallah 13) were evicted when, mainly for conservation reasons, the lake management authorities decided to dredge the reclaimed land and return it to the lake. These families were then resettled some 1.2 kilometers away near the Hazratbal basin and about 200 meters away from the lakeshore. The new settlement, called the “Fishermen Community”, was connected to the lake through a narrow navigation channel so that fisher boats could reach the Dal (G.K. 07.03.2008). In 2008, Arfat and Ali (2013) undertook a comprehensive study that “endeavours to assess the impact of the said resettlement on the displaced population of the Fishermen Community.” They reported that the families were given fifty-by-thirty-foot plots, as well as financial compensation for the land they had owned and their demolished houses. Forty-four percent of the respondents reported having received compensation between 1 million and 2.05 million rupees, and that they had to pay 4,530 rupees for each plot. Many have built solid concrete houses with three to five rooms as well as a kitchen. Electricity, drinking water, drainage, and access to roads and basic sanitation were mentioned among the positive effects of the resettlement. However, negative effects were also listed—the most important being a reduction of about 50 percent in their monthly income. Because of the decline in the Dal’s fish population, most families now depend on the fish brought from other locations by traders that the fisherwomen purchase for resale in the market with little profit to themselves. Due to the drastic decline of fish in the lake, they reported that out of the two hundred fishing license holders, only about one hundred are actually full-time fishers, because their catch barely covers the annual cost of the license (five hundred rupees) and the monthly fee (two hundred rupees). They said that before being evicted, they had a monthly income between five and six thousand rupees through catching their own fish from the Dal, but they now earn only some two thousand to twenty-five hundred rupees through fishing. Because their traditional economy no longer provides a living, about 80 percent of the young male fishers have taken up other occupations in the city and now earn their money as carpenters, masons, drivers, tailors, salesmen, or car repairmen. To a certain extent, this compensates for the roughly 50 percent decrease in the fishers’ traditional monthly income. Moreover, resettlement has brought

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many positive changes in the form of drinking water, electricity, drainage, and access to roads and basic sanitation. Informants also acknowledged that the resettlement has “brought a very good effect on the education and each and every family is now sending their children to the school right from the 5–6 years of age” (Arfat and Ali 2013: 3). Asked about their claims on the government, the fishers mentioned that (a) some loan facilities based on noninterest terms should be made available, (b) compensation should be given for the lotus gardens they claim to have owned before, (c) roads and wastewater drains should be improved, and (d) a community park and playground should be provided for their children (Arfat and Ali (2013: 4). The authors concluded that although there has been a generally positive impact on the evicted population, the resettlement scheme has not yet met all the basic requirements of the evictees, and further steps are needed to ensure that compensation for their eviction is on the level specified in the Supreme Court guidelines (Arfat and Ali (2013: 1). Having said all this, it may well be that if all measures to curb the deterioration of the Dal fail, and if, in addition, all measures to reintroduce the traditional fish Schizothorax into the lake and build up a stable population of this species are unsuccessful, there will be no more working fishers on the Dal within the next few decades. This is even more probable because, as mentioned before, the Gad Hanz are a very small endogamous Sunni community. Being, in the eyes of the broader society, the lowest in the socioeconomic hierarchy, no one will normally give his daughter to a Gad Hanz, although they will usually accept a fishermen’s daughter when it is a “love marriage” with a son falling in love with a Gad Hanz girl. As described already, most of the young men have now given up fishing and found jobs in the city. Hence, in the near future, if fishing becomes less and less rewarding, more intermarriages will take place between these young men who now live in the city and girls from other zāt, because the old aversion to giving a daughter to a fisherman’s son was due mainly to his being Gad Hanz with its traditional occupation and poor livelihood, and not to being a member of the Dar zāt.

Notes 1. Grierson and Shastri (1916) refer to fishermen/fisherwomen as gāḍ raṭanwôl/gāḍ raṭanwājeñ, and a net fisher in particular as gāḍhönzü. The latter has now become the general term for a fisher. 2. Walter Slaje, pers. comm. 3. Lawrence (1895: 157–58) gave the Kashmiri names of ten species of fish, but not their scientific names.

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4. Next to young carp, these small species mainly belong to the genera Chrossocheilus, Labeo, and Puntius.

5. These are mainly species of the genera Botia, Crossocheilus, Labeo, and Puntius. It can also be assumed that most of the fish species listed in Qureshi et al. (2007) found in the River Jhelum also live or once lived in Dal Lake. 6. For the different species of Schizothorax, see Qureshi et al. (2007: 44). 7. On the endemic detritophagus and herbivorous species of Schizothorax, see Ghanai et al. (2011), Sunder et al. (1979).

PART

II



9  The Degradation of the Dal Causes and Impacts The progressive degradation and eutrophication of Dal Lake has been observed since the end of the nineteenth century. Year after year since about the 1980s, ecologists, and especially hydrologists and botanists, have published numerous scientific papers on the lake’s aggravating degradation. Already in 1979, a short note was published in Nature: A study conducted by the botany department of Kashmir University says that if the present rate of pollution continues, the lake will be dead in the next 80 years. . . . The pollutants are the wash-off of fertilizers and pesticides from the surrounding banks, the paddy and orchard fields, and the famous Mughal gardens. There is also sewage released from the houseboats, hotels, shops and residential buildings that have mushroomed about this tourist attraction. . . . Chief Minister Sheikh Abdullah has recently allocated 200 million rupees for a project to beautify and preserve it, and a team of foreign experts from the Commonwealth Fund for Technical Cooperation has already drawn up a rescue plan. In the first phase of the project, a ring road will be built around the lake to prevent further encroachment. In the second phase, illegal residential colonies that have spread about the lake will be shifted to a new site. Steps will also be taken to plant trees in the surrounding areas, restrict grazing and desilt the lake. (Anonymous)

Most articles quoted in the following start by describing a “primordial pristine state” when the Dal was either uninfluenced or influenced only barely by human activities. The Mogul emperor Jahangir (1569–1627) already reported in his memoirs, “All the people of Kashmir drink the water of a lake

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that is near the city, and is called Dall” (Tūzuk-i-Jahangῑrῑ 1829/1909: 93). Moreover, most early travelers who had seen the Dal in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries mentioned the extremely clear and fresh water that everybody used for drinking and cooking. When at the beginning of the twentieth century the degradation of the Dal became more and more obvious and many more warnings were published by ecologists and concerned citizens, the government of India together with the government of Jammu and Kashmir ( J & K) appointed agencies to analyze the environmental situation of the Dal and Nageen Lakes and come up with suggestions for corrective actions. The first study (GSDE) was published in 1987. This was followed by APC, a much more comprehensive study making major technological proposals to halt the looming environmental calamity. They came to the general conclusion that the waters of all these lakes [in Kashmir valley] are polluted by agricultural run-off and human and animal excrements. There is a considerable danger that remedial measures introduced to overcome the problems of Dal and Nagin Lakes could be mere palliatives if they ignore the wider ecological issues that need to be addressed within Kashmir Valley. This, we believe, would be a profound error. (APC/ODA 1989: 142; see also Kaul and Handoo 1998; Vass 1980)

Thus, in the following, I shall describe these “wider environmental issues,” the intertwined natural but mainly anthropogenic causes jeopardizing the environmental equilibrium of the Dal: Srinagar’s population growth, the destruction of wetlands, silting and sedimentation, encroachment, and tourism. This will be followed by a description of the resulting negative impact on the hydrology of Dal Lake that is causing the ongoing deterioration and eutrophication.

Population Growth and Sewage I wish that some great architect would take charge of the planning and rebuilding of Srinagar . . . a drainage system [should be] introduced, and so much else done to convert Srinagar into a fairy city of dreamlike beauty, through which runs the Vitastha [ Jhelum] and the many canals sluggishly wind their way with the shikaras plying on them and the houseboats clinging to the banks. This is no fancy picture, for fairyland lies all around it; but unfortunately human hands and human folly have tried to cover it here and there. Still it peeps out through slum and dirt. —Jawaharlal Nehru 1940, quoted in ODA 1989

Before the twentieth century, population growth in the Jammu and Kashmir state was very slow, and even in 1961 the census still showed only about

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three million people. But from then on, the population has grown continuously up to what is now about twelve million. The population of the capital Srinagar stayed very small over a long period. According to Neve (n.d.), it had reached only 207,000 inhabitants in 1931, and over the whole period from 1823 to 1891, population figures oscillated between 112,000 und 122,000 individuals as Lawrence reports in 1895.1 But from about the middle of the twentieth century onward, with the continuous growth of Jammu and Kashmir’s population, the number of inhabitants of the capital also grew rapidly (figures 9.1a, b). Hence, from 1950 to 2001, the population of the city grew by an average of about 5 percent every decade. Recently, Wani (2012: 593) reported that Srinagar, which had occupied an area of 12.8 km² in 1901, now spreads over a region of 278.1 km², thereby transforming more and more of its nearby agricultural land and marshy areas for social-urban use. With the growth of the city and its population,

Figures 9.1a, b. Population growth 1823–2001 and expansion of Srinagar 1901–2000. Graphs by the author. Source: Primary Census Abstracts Jammu and Kashmir, published in Wani 2012: Table 2, p. 601.

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the amount of uncleaned sewage with high loads of nitrogen and phosphate reaching the lake has also increased tremendously. In his summary, also referring to Wani and Khaikar (2011) analysis, R. A. Wani (2012: 600) concluded that the uneven and unplanned growth of the city has given rise to a number of problems like loss of water bodies and agricultural land, poor housing infrastructure, sewage and drainage problems etc. The internal morphology of Srinagar city is under constant changing because of the changing land use pattern of the city and its surrounding areas. The rate at which agriculture and water area is decreasing is of serious concern which needs immediate and decisive policy making [see also Kuchay et al. 2016].

At the beginning of the twentieth century, there were less than a hundred houseboats on the Dal and Nageen Lakes (Swami 1998b), but the number of people living on dungas2 and houseboats grew. The Master Plan—Srinagar City (MPSC 1971: 61–62) reported that 529 houseboats were available on the lake at the beginning of the 1970s, and it was proposed to boost the tourist business so that houseboats shall cater for the requirements of about 3,500 beds which means that an additional 750 houseboats are to be constructed over a period of next 20 years. Mooring and drainage facilities for about 1,300 houseboats (total) have been planned in Planning Division “A.”

Over the years, the number of houses and huts on the islands in the lake grew, and in 1981, the census recorded that some 4,580 people were permanently resident on houseboats (Swami 1998b). Twenty years later, DRP (2000: vol. 2, part 1, p. 248, tables 9.10 and 9.11) reported that 775 houseboats and 328 dungas were moored on the lake. In 2000, a total of 4,210 houses and 3,493 huts were registered by DRP (2000: vol. 2, part 1, p. 249, tables 9.12 and 9.13), and in the 1990s, LWDA believed that “44,833 people are now resident on the houseboats and in the hamlets, and assuming that just 5,000 tourists lived on them through the year, the lake bore the burden of waste from 49,833 people” (Swami 1998b), because only very few of the houseboats and houses and none of the dungas were equipped with sanitary tanks. Furthermore, a survey published in DRP (2000: vol. 2, part 1, pp. 256–57, table 9.21:) showed that from the 6,229 households living on the islands in the Dal, 2,924 owned and cultivated the vegetable gardens with an acreage of 3,961.1 hectares (for details, see chap. 6). The influx of different pollutants, especially nitrogen (N) and phosphate (P), from these acreages in addition to those from the catchment area, from along the different canals, and from the houseboats and dungas is leading to the growing degradation of the Dal (see also Najar and Khan 2012). The very high concentration of N and P especially in the areas where houseboats are moored and in the

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neighborhood of the islands has not changed and has increased even further up to the present (2017). For the general influx of the nutrients P and N, ENEX (quoted in Zutshi 1987: 574) already calculated in 1978 that the quantities of phosphorous and nitrogen discharged into the lake water from human waste and catchment area have been calculated at 46.3 and 634 tonnes per year. The quantity of P and N that leaves the lake through the outflow was found to be 40.8 and 545.1 tonnes per year. This leaves a net input of 5.5 tonnes of P and 89.9 tonnes of N per year which finally accumulates in the sediments and serves as a nutrient sink.

Najar and Khan (2012: 2377) pointed out that the “water quality variations are mainly due to domestic wastewaters and agricultural runoff besides seasonal variations and catchment geology.” Regarding the domestic wastewaters, alongside those from the city (see Bhat et al. 2017), it is especially those from the houseboats that must be taken into account. Their influence is especially high in the tourist season from spring to autumn when more than twenty thousand persons are estimated to be living in tourist houseboats and dungas (Zutshi 1987: 574). All the huts and houses on the Dal islands, the dungas, and most of the tourist houseboats have no sanitation system, and, especially in the months from July to September, fecal pollution also leads to high concentrations of enteropathogenic and enterotoxigenic strains of Escherichia coli—the etiological agents of diarrheal diseases (Koul and Panhotra 1988; Vass 1980).

Silting, Sedimentation, and Encroachment: The Shrinking Lake The most important natural and relatively slow process impinging on the deterioration of the Dal is sedimentation, which is caused by deposits of silt and debris carried down from the catchment area via the Telbal Nala. In agreement with Moorcroft (1832: 258),3 Lawrence (1895: 22) observed in the 1890s that the space of open water of the Dal was being reduced continuously: People say that the lake is silting up, and there can be no doubt that as years pass by the deposit of the Arrah river [a tributary to the Telbal Nala] which feeds the Dal must result in the lake becoming even more shallow than it is now, as its only real outlet is through the narrow gate, the Dal Darwaza at Drogjun, which lets out the lake water.

It can be supposed that over many centuries, the amount of debris and silt washed down from the catchment area remained more or less constant. Since, however, about the first quarter of the twentieth century, the growth of villages and even the founding of new villages together with an expansion

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of arable land in conjunction with deforestation and erosion have led to an increase in the amount of deposit reaching the lake.4 For the last quarter of the twentieth century, Zutshi (1987) estimated that the Telbal Nala annually carries eighty tons of sediment load in addition to many pollutants from the catchment area into the Dal (for a detailed analysis of the impact of the land use and land cover changes in the Dal catchment area on Dal Lake, see Badar 2010). However, about 80 percent of the total load of debris and silt accumulates in the Hazratbal basin. Wani et al. (1996) found that the concentration of suspended solids in the Dal decreases with the distance from the mouth of the Telbal Nala that discharges the solids into the Hazratbal basin. Due to continuous precipitation, the concentration of suspended solids in the surface water decreases through the basins, showing a range between 155 to 288 mg/l in the Hazratbal basin in the north, to 108 to 180 mg/l in the Gagribal basin in the south, and to 60 to 148 mg/l in Nageen Lake. To gain a better understanding of this process of silting and the building of sediment layers, Wani et al. (1996: 29) collected more precise data at different spots on the lake in the late 1990s. Their data analysis showed that as much as 60.8 tons of silt are drained into the Hazratbal basin from the Telbal Nala every year; and that since 1964, the average rate of sedimentation has been 0.52 ± 0.04 cm/year in Dal Lake and 0.41 ± 0.05 cm/year in Nageen Lake. Based on data for 1987 published in DRP (2000: 1:123–24), it was calculated that if this process of siltation were to continue at the same magnitude, the life of the Dal would be 364 ± 50 years. To reduce the magnitude of silting and the influx of nutrients originating from the Telbal Nala, a small silt basin was constructed at the end of the twentieth century (see figure 9.2,b). However, this had only a limited effect. Recently, in October 2017, this topic was raised again, and when discussing an “action plan on the decisions of ‘Scientific Advisory Committee,’” the minister of state for housing and urban development, Asiea Naqash, said “that artificial water bodies and retention ponds, which is an important component of the project, should be created and upgraded to entrap the nutrients in the lake only” (KO 22.10.2017). But the shrinking and shallowing of the lake is not just due to continuous siltation. More significant for the shrinking of the area of open water of the Dal was, and still is, encroachment. At least since the nineteenth century, many islands have been enlarged artificially to make space for more agriculture and new buildings. Moreover, the construction of raised fields and floating gardens, mainly in the neighborhood of the market gardeners’ islands in order to augment their harvest and income, contribute to the shrinking of the Dal’s open waters. Due to these artificially enlarged islands as well as the increasing construction of raised fields already in the 1980s, Trisal (1987: 44) wrote,

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The gradual reclamation of the lake to provide building and vegetable growing land and the increase in the area of floating gardens have combined with natural processes to reduce the area of open water within the lake area. The present open lake area of only 12 km2 is but a vestige of what it was even in the eighteenth century, and is only slightly more than one-half of the area existing at the turn of this century [cf. the recent analysis based on remote sensing data in chapter 6].

An even greater reduction of the Dal’s surface is caused through filling up the shallow water in many places with sand, rubble, and earth to encroach deep into the open waters. On some of this newly created land, vegetables are grown and willows planted, but much of the space is used for the construction of houses and shacks.5 DRP (2000: 557, table 11.3) reported on the basis of the “Srinagar Development Authority” draft master plan prepared for 2000–2001 that the population on the Dal at the end of the last century had reached about thirty-nine thousand individuals.

The Destruction of Wetlands In many parts of the world, the different types of wetlands have always been landscapes of great importance from not only an ecological but also an economic point of view (C.W. 1971; Haslam 2003; R.C.M. 2013) when drainage was used to obtain agricultural land from bogs and marshes or from fenlands as Irvine (2016) has described for England’s East Anglian fenlands. In Kashmir, the wetlands have always been of utmost importance, because the water from mountain streams was filtered through vast areas of swamp and marsh. This deposited masses of silt in these areas so that less entered the Dal or even less reached the Jhelum River and finally Wular Lake (M. A. Khan 2008). More important, however, was the retention of nutrients through the marsh vegetation, especially when, with the growth of the city, more and more sewage was spilled into the lake and, more recently, when more chemical fertilizer reached the Dal from the agricultural areas of the catchment. Meuleman et al. (2004: 459) have shown experimentally that for both nutrients (P and N), harvesting the aquatic vegetation in September was the main removal mechanism from the ditch system with 92 kg (80 percent of annual input N) and 14 kg of phosphorous (95 percent of annual input) removed [see also Meuleman et al. 2002].6

From historical sources, we know that in the last quarter of the nineteenth century the whole area north of the Dal still consisted of a vast marshy region that, in the accounts of the time, was revealingly called the “Tel Bal Morass,” as, for instance, Bates (1980: 371) reported in 1870. Then, when in

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the middle of the twentieth century the Foreshore Road was built along the northern part of the lake, most of the area was drained so that the waters from the Telbal Nala reached the Dal directly without being filtered.7 These large wetlands, through which most of the waters flowed, were systematically reduced to make space for agricultural land and urbanization projects (figures 9.2a,b). Now, this northern morass is completely gone, and as R. A. Wani (2012: 603) reported, all other marshy areas in the region also shrank in the period between 1971 and 2011 at a rate of 71.96 percent (for details, see Amin and Fazal 2011: table 1 and boxes 1 and 2). Through the rapid growth of villages and agricultural land in the catchment area, more sediment, sewage, and also nutrients from chemical fertilizers found their way into the Dal. As a result, the J & K High Court felt obliged to question the effect of the de-weeding operations on the Dal carried out by the Lakes and Waterways Development Authority (LAWDA)8 as part of their efforts to curb the deterioration of Dal Lake. Rashid (GK 06.05.2014) reported: Observing that before the massive urbanisation, a large area around the Dal Lake was marshy and comprised of wetlands that used to serve as detoxifying fields, the J & K High Court said urban and agriculture runoffs would first flow into large wetlands and marshy areas. . . . The marshy lands round the Dal Lake, full of weeds having detoxifying effects, have been filled up and converted into residential and commercial sites and the runoff s, therefore, directly flow into the Dal Lake, acting as fertilizers for weed growing on the Lake bed, making de-weeding operations meaningless.

This dramatic loss of wetlands, which had always acted as a sponge halting masses of water, around the lake was felt most painfully when a major flood hit the region in September 2014. Quoting S. Romshoo (GK 04.10.2014), the head of the Earth Science Department at Kashmir University, A. S. Wani pointed out, In and around Srinagar we have lost 20 wetlands to urban colonies, particularly in southern areas. Shrinking of most wetlands, deforestation, siltation and overgrazing has lowered the ability of our environment to absorb excessive rainwater and has thus increased the vulnerability of the Jhelum drainage basin to flooding. . . . Hokersar [wetlands situated about 17 km west of Srinagar] is facing the brunt of societal greed and government apathy. The wetland area has shrunk from 18.75 km2 in 1969 to 12.8 km2 at present and its open water body has shrunk from 1.74 km2 in 1969 to less than one km2 [for details, see Romshoo et al. 2011; Romshoo and Rashid 2012].

Houseboats, Hotels, and the Tourism Dilemma The impact of tourism on Dal Lake has positive as well as negative aspects. For many residents, especially the owners of houseboats, the impact is

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Figures 9.2.a, b. A comparison of the situation north of the Dal Lake in 1965 and 2011. Sources: The KH-surveillance system July 1963 to June 1967 and for 2011, Copyright DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06. Note: In 1965, large areas were still covered with marshes but also with floating gardens and raised fields that retained large amounts of water and masses of silt that also locked up many nutrients. When the Foreshore Road was built, the whole region north of the lake was drained and transformed into agricultural and building land. The arrow points to the silt basin north of the lake constructed at the end of the twentieth century. (Sources: The KH-surveillance system July 1963 to June 1967 and for 2011, Copyright DigitalGlobe Incorporated, 2011-04-23T06.)

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positive, because the beautiful scenery as environmental capital and their traditional, romantic houseboats as cultural capital (Girard and Nijkamp 2009) can be transformed into cash value via tourism. The opening up of the “tourist niche” quickly motivated many to take the promising chance to make a profit, and at the beginning of the last century about two hundred boats were already serving tourists on the Dal and Nageen Lakes. To accommodate more and more tourists, the number of houseboats grew from 250 in 1987 (Trisal 1987: 47) to 775 in 2000 (DRP 2000: 248, table 9.10). The negative aspect is that the sewage from these houseboats, which drains untreated into the lake, contributes to the mass of nutrients endangering the lake’s ecosystem. But the number of hotels also grew over these years, and “many were allowed to be built in the Boulevard area, which was once part of a dense forest, and these were permitted to discharge their waste into the lake” (Swami 1998b). As Kaul and Bobb (1982: 66) reported, Till the mid-‘70s, Kashmir could boast of a mere 34 hotels, including only two large capacity ones, which offered a combined total of 572 rooms or 1,250 beds. . . . in 1973, for instance, tourist arrivals in Kashmir stood at 1,95,846, an increase of 47 per cent over the previous year. . . . By last month, Srinagar was snowed under a hotel invasion with no less than 120 hotels in the city alone, . . . providing a total of 7,200 beds . . . A one-kilometer stretch known as Boulevard Road has no less than 20 hotels currently living cheek by jowl and even more under various stages of construction. . . . In Kashmir . . . politics and business are on the same side of the coin and the new hoteliers are part of the same club whose members are scions of the state’s dominant business families.

Compared to the houseboats, these hotels have a more accountable impact on the Dal because they produce a larger quantity of waste and sewage. Many are lined up near the lake’s shore, but those built in the city also drain their sewage, together with the sewage from the city’s inhabitants, into the lake if they are not connected to canals leading to the Jhelum. This drastic increase in sewage and other waste discharged—for example, plastic materials9 and other packaging and items thrown into the water by tourists led to a paradoxical situation. The more tourists came, the more money was made—but, on the other hand, the environmental equilibrium of the lake was endangered. Comparable to the “tragedy of the commons,” every rise in the number of tourists augments the stress on the fragile ecosystem, thereby bringing it closer to a collapse with the effect that tourists will avoid the area in future. Especially regarding solid waste, the commissioner secretary of housing and urban development (No. HUD/Plan/28-III/2017 dated 29 March 2017) directed the different commissioners to put pressure on the issue of solid waste segregation. “But as per reliable sources, the order is yet to be implemented. . . . The order says that every household and every waste generator

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should start segregating their waste into two bins—green and blue (green for organic waste and blue for inorganic waste). But as of now, not even a single municipal ward of Srinagar has been covered under segregation of waste at source” (GK 03.05.2017). One year later, the High Court instructed the government to implement a waste management system in tourist resorts (GK 25.04.2018). After identifying the most important proximate causes for the ongoing degradation of Dal Lake, I shall now describe the resulting ecological impact and the limnologic and hydrologic consequences for the degradation and eutrophication of the lake.

On Nutrients, Pollution, and Eutrophication Generalized and constant assertions about Dal Lake’s hydrological facts are not possible due to the ever-changing macro- and microecological and other environmental influences. On the one hand, this concerns the yearly cyclic but erratic hydraulic inputs from the Telbal Nala with minimum input values of an average of 6.4 ± 1.1 x 106 m3 between October and December and maximum values of 32.0 ± 4.8 x 106 m3 in April, May, and again in August, as measured in 1999 and 2000 by Solim and Wanganeo (2007: 4, table 1 and 2). These inputs stem mainly from the Telbal Nala and correlate with low and high flushing rate values for the lake in general and with regional low and high retention times of sediment and nutrients. On the other hand, this concerns the different, more or less erratic anthropogenic impacts: the amounts of sewage and other organic waste fed into the lake mainly in the tourist season from the city, the lake dwellers on the islands, and the houseboats. Furthermore, for some decades now, more and more market gardeners have been applying chemical fertilizers to their fields that are partly, mainly in times of heavy rainfall, washed into the lake. Nonetheless, despite all these problems, which make generalizing assertions about the hydrological situation of the Dal Figure 9.3. Locations of water Lake difficult,10 some data published by var- samples taken in 2013 and 2015. ious authors, supplemented by some of my Authors own data and Copyright own (see figure 9.3), will be presented in the 2011 DigitalGlobe Incorporated, following. 2011-04-23T06.

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pH Values and Conductivity pH Value As typical for marl lakes, the pH values of the Dal’s water range between 7.0 and 9.0, as published in the 1980s and 1990s by many authors. Ara et al. (2004) meticulously collected monthly data in 2000 and 2001 and reported values between 6.7 and 7.8. The ten samples I took in August 2013 showed an average value of 7.31 ± 0.18, and these did not differ from the 23 samples I took in July 2015 that showed an average of 7.32 ± 0.17.

Conductivity The conductivity, measured in μS cm-1, indicates the flow of electricity through ions (electrolytes) dissolved in, for example, water, thus giving, in our case, a general impression of the concentration of mainly Ca++, Mg++, and K+ ions in the lake’s water. The data collected monthly by Ara et al. (2004) in 2000 and 2001 gave conductivity values ranging between 161 and 400 μS cm-1 depending on the place where and the time when the samples were taken. To gain a rough impression of how the concentration of electrolytes differs in the water of the Telbal Nala, the Dal, and the Nageen basin, I determined the conductivity of ten samples in 2013. The data showed, as expected, a north–south gradient along the passage of the water through the lake (figure 9.4), because a great deal of the ions (mainly calcium, see figure 9.5) originate from the Telbal Nala in the north. The conductivity at the mouth of the Telbal and in the most northern part of the Hazratbal basin into which the Telbal discharges, showed an average value of 251 ± 33.2 μS cm-1. At 275 μS cm-1, the highest values were found in the water of the stream itself; and at 228 μS cm-1, conductivity was still relatively high in the northern and middle part of the Hazratbal basin (Telbal Nala, Dal, in figure 9.4).11 In all other regions, values were more or less the same, and, taken together, they showed an average value of 199.9 ± 31.3 μS cm-1. This is caused by the dilution of the introduced ions in the lake’s water body, but mainly due to the CaCO3–P interaction with the subsequent precipitation of tricalcium phosphate as will be described in detail later. That drastic macroenvironmental events can quickly change the lake’s conductivity was evident from the analysis of twenty-three water samples taken in August 2015. This was about one year after the River Jhelum had burst its banks in September 2014, inundating most southern and western parts of the Dal. In the following summer, most of the vegetable fields were still underwater, and very few tourists stayed on the houseboats. The analysis of nineteen of the samples taken showed an average value of only

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Figure 9.4. The measured conductivity (µS cm-1) in Dal and Nageen Lakes. Graph by the author.

142.7 ± 18.4 μS-1, a lower conductivity value compared to the average of 199.9 ± 31.3 μS cm-1 from samples I took in August 2013 at about the same spots. The reason for the difference can be explained through the extreme dilution of the ions caused by the flood, many homesteads having been destroyed and abandoned, and tourists staying away and thereby reducing the houseboats’ sewage output. Only four out of the twenty-three collected samples showed a high average value (254 ± 77.8 μS-1). These exceptional samples were taken from the narrow canals between the extremely dense populated islands and semi-islands in the southwestern part of the lake. These often much-polluted canals (images 9.1a,b ) showed, even after the flood, very little or even no flow velocity and thus hardly any water exchange with the lake, so that ions accumulated there over time.12

The Electrolytes Calcium, Magnesium, and Potassium A more detailed analysis of how the important electrolytes calcium (Ca), magnesium (Mg), and potassium (K) are distributed in the lake’s water showed that the concentrations of Mg and K were relatively low and constant over all the sites where samples were taken. In comparison, however, Ca showed much higher values, especially very high ones for the water of the Telbal Nala and still relatively high ones in the northern part of the Hazratbal basin, south of the mouth of the mountain stream. This was to be expected, because the water of the Telbal originates from a Ca-rich catchment area (figure 9.5). The recently analyzed samples collected monthly between 2000

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Figure 9.5. Concentration of Ca, Mg, and K (mg/l) in the Telbal Nala and on their way through the Dal. Graph by the author.

and 2001 by Ara et al. (2004; see also Bhat and Ali 2012) showed values between 16.5 and 30.0 mg/l; however, with certain seasonal variations and principally, as many other authors have also shown, with a decreasing order of Ca++ > Mg++ > Na+ > SiO3 > K+ (Ishaq and Kaul 1988; Jeelani and Shah 2006; Kaul 1977; Trisal and Kaul 1983).

The Nutrients Nitrogen and Phosphorus The nutrients nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) are of utmost importance for all plant growth. Under normal lacustrine conditions, their most common ionic forms are nitrate (NO3-)13 and phosphate either as monophosphate (HPO42-) or as dihydrogen phosphate (H2PO4-). In waters with pH values between 7.4 and 9.5 and a high concentration of calcium carbonate (CaCo3), a CaCO3–P interaction takes place with the subsequent precipitation of tricalcium phosphate (Ca3[PO4]2) that is deposited in the lake’s sediment (for comprehensive accounts, see Sabah and Wanganeo 2007, 2008; Solim 2008; Solim and Wanganeo 2007). This also explains why phosphate is rarely or not detectable in the open water of the Dal (figure 9.6).14 Also, as Trisal and Kaul (1983: 671) reported, The lake sediments showed a marked reduction in the concentration of N, P, K and C during the late spring and summer. Larger amounts of these elements were found towards the autumn, and these higher levels were maintained through winter until early spring. The reduction in the concentration of these mineral nutrients was greatest during the growing season of the macrophytes.

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If the load, especially of phosphate, in a lake exceeds a certain concentration, an exponential proliferation occurs of the filamentous green algae Oedogonium15 and macrophytes, mainly Ceratophyllum. The increasing mass of organic material leads to an additional accumulation of P in the sediment when it decays in late summer and autumn.16 The decomposition of this plant material by microorganisms also increases the extraction of oxygen from the water body. If the concentration of dissolved oxygen falls below a certain value, fish and other oxygen-consuming animals will die. Unlike Ca, which is introduced into the lake mainly through eluviation of minerals in the catchment area, the phosphate and nitrate come not only from city sewage and other human waste from the households on the lake islands and from the houseboats, but also from the settlements in the catchment area where chemical fertilizers are used. Already in the 1970s, the Enex Report (E.R. 1978, quoted in Zutshi and Ticku 1990) estimated that 63.67 tons of N and 49.2 tons of P are released into the Dal annually due mainly to the extensive influx of raw sewage.17 This correlates, as Ishaq and Kaul (1989: 324, table 4) have shown, with the population growth in the different subcatchments that grew between 1971 and 1981 from 185,000 to 260,000 individuals, with the Dachigam–Telbal region and Srinagar North showing the highest rates. Based on these data, they calculated that the total P input rose in this decade, depending on the different proposed input levels,18 by up to 40 percent. It was, however, shown that in the open water of the Dal, the concentrations of P and N were very low and stayed rather constant, as also reported by Handa et al. (1991) and by Sarwar et al. (1996). These studies found an average concentration of total phosphorus of 1420 μgl-1 between the floating gardens in the heavily populated area compared to 599 μgl-1 in open water—a difference in about the same order of magnitude as that reported by Jeelani and Shah (2006: 15). The samples I took in August 2013 in the open water areas of the Dal and the Nageen basin showed that the values for phosphate and nitrate were extremely low or even below the detectable range. Whereas the low P concentration in open water can be explained by the CaCO3–P interaction mentioned above, the relatively low concentration of nitrate is possibly caused by its rapid uptake by especially green filamentous algae of the genus Oedogonium (see figure 5.1) and also by the free-floating water ferns Salveria natans and Azolla cristata. Four of my samples, however, gave relatively high values for both nutrients of between 1.6 and 5.7 (mg/l) for phosphate and 4.2 and 7.6 (mg/l) for nitrate. These samples were taken from the Telbal Nala itself and from the most northern part of the Hazratbal basin. Others were taken near the congregation of settlements with many raised fields (ḍēmb) and from spots where very many houseboats are moored near the sluice gate of the Dal (figure 9.6).

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Figure 9.6. Concentration of N and P (mg/l) in the Telbal Nala through different areas of Dal and Nageen Lakes, to the Dal Gate. Figure by the author. Note: The open water of the lakes showed no values.

These locations showing a high concentration of these elements stand out due to the high input of chemical fertilizers washed from the fields into the lake or due to the masses of sewage from the houseboats. Already at the beginning of the twentieth century, it was recognized that the pollution stemming from the catchment area should be curbed. Neve (n.d.: 37) reported, “In order to absolutely guarantee the purity of the water and safety of a city so liable to cholera epidemics as Srinagar, it was felt necessary in 1901 to remove every human habitation and stop all cultivation in the valley above the reservoir.” However, this plan was never put into action consistently; therefore, in the period between 1970 and 1977, as Trisal (1987: 47) reported, the population in the catchment area increased from 178,000 to 250,040. From the data compiled by Qadri and Yousuf (2008, table 1), it is evident that already in the thirty-one years between 1977 and 2008, the amount of N and P in the Dal grew tremendously. This correlates with the expansion of the city and the populating of the Telbal Nala’s catchment area. Recently Mushtaq et al. (2013, 2015) concluded from their thorough analyses that in the last fourteen years (1992–2005), in both the higher and lower elevations of the Dal Lake catchment area, barren lands showed an increase of 4.44 km2 and that the agriculture and horticulture land in these regions declined by 1.81 and 7.57 km2 respectively, as these areas were transformed mainly into settlements and residential areas. The same is true for Old Srinagar, where agro-horticultural areas were converted mostly into residential areas—also in favor of settlements for a growing population—with the effect that even more nutrient-containing sewage enters the water body.19 As Sibilo et al. (2013) have shown, an accumulated surplus of chemical fertilizers is stored in the soil and is washed out continuously by the rain with the

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effect that a constant flow of phosphate and nitrate reaches the aquifers—in this case, from the catchment area through the Telbal Nala into the Dal.20 In addition, starting in about the 1980s, the poorer market gardeners of the lake began to buy and use chemical fertilizers, because they had neither access to the big boats (kōtch) to transport waterweeds nor the manpower or money to hire workers to gather the plants to produce compost. As a general result, over the last decades, the concentration of N has grown extremely (figure 9.7), whereas the P values, with the exception of the Hazratbal area, have risen only slightly or not at all. The high P values from the Hazratbal basin can be explained by the fact that phosphate from the catchment area has just entered the lake there and has not yet undergone the CaCO3–P interaction in large quantities. Furthermore, it can be stated that the samples taken near the settlements, between the nearby raised fields, between the moored houseboats, from the nearly still waters between the islands, and especially from the extremely congested canals in the Old City show very high or even extremely high concentrations of N and P. In a recent paper, Mushtaq et al. (2013) published data collected meticulously at the same sites over the period of June 2010 to April 2011. Here, in their diagrams, it can be demonstrated how much the values for the nitrate and phosphate concentration in Dal Lake’s water differ from site to site and from month to month (figures 9.8a,b). The only general assertion that can be made is that from late November to February, all values are minimal— which can possibly be explained by the fact that in this period the influx of nutrients from the agricultural areas in the catchment region as well as from the vegetable gardens into the lake is minimal. Aside from these seasonal

Figure 9.7. The increment of nitrogen/nitrate and phosphate in the years 1977, 2000, and 2008. Graph by the author based on data compiled by Qadri and Yousuf 2008, Table 1.

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Figures 9.8.a, b. The monthly distribution of nitrate and total phosphorus concentration at different sites. Graphs by the author based on data obtained from Mushtaq et al. 2013, Table 1.

oscillations and the local anthropogenic factors that always influence environmental conditions, the extreme weather events that occur from time to time can have a drastic impact on the lake’s ecosystem. This was the case in September 2014 when days of extreme rainfall in the valley were followed by a devastating flood. The Jhelum had broken its banks, flooded Srinagar, and raised the water level of the Dal up to three meters over normal. The following spring and summer, a change in the plant composition on the lake became evident: all the lotus had succumbed, but now masses of singhara, the water chestnut (Trapa natans) were seen. Whereas Torrens (1862: 271) reported that large parts of the Dal were covered with these plants in the middle of the nineteenth century, over the years they had become extremely rare, so that when I was there between 2009 and 2013 I found only a few plants at just one spot.

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However, one year after the big flood, many hectares, mainly in the northwestern part of the Nageen basin, were covered with them, forming a cohesive mass on the lake’s surface. Even more striking was the sight of millions of yellow waterlilies that had now spread over many areas of the Dal, whereas in 2004 they were found mainly between the lotus fields and near the raised fields and islands. Over the years, however, they propagated, and many were uprooted by the big flood in 2014. These plants were now scattered over many parts of the lake, and they multiplied tremendously so that, in 2015, many areas could no longer be traversed with a boat (figures 9.9a-d).

Figure 9.9.a–d. The distribution and expansion of yellow water lilies over parts of Dal Lake in 2004, 2011, 2015, and 2020. The arrow marks the cleaned space to resettle houseboats. Source: Google Earth. Note: A reduction of settlements on the shore can be seen due to the rehabilitation project.

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Comparing all the available data on the hydrological properties of Dal Lake that have been published already over the last five decades and those collected by myself, it is obvious that a generalized statement about Dal Lake’s trophic level is not possible. This is because some regions with a high rate of flow and low values of P can be classified as mesotrophic. Other regions with a higher retention rate, mainly in the areas of the inhabited islands and raised fields, can be classified as lying somewhere on a continuum between mesotrophic and eutrophic. But the water in the narrow canals through the extremely congested areas in the southern part of the lake and especially in the Old City in which there is hardly any water exchange are extremely eutrophic. Here, in the Rainawari area, not only are masses of rubbish dumped next to or into the water, but all feces are flushed directly into the canals as well (images 9.1a,b ).

Images 9.1a, b. Typical conditions in the canals in the Old City. Photos by the author. Note: There is hardly any water exchange, and, in most places, not only does domestic sewage including feces reach the water unfiltered, but masses of rubbish are also dumped on the shore or in the water.

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It should also be mentioned here that next to the growing influx of phosphate and nitrate into the Dal, a dramatic increase in the application of organophosphate pesticides can be observed in recent decades. These pesticides, which many market gardeners spray on the fields two to four times in spring and early summer, not only endanger many animals living on and around the lake but also jeopardize the health of the people. This was revealed in a study by Banday et al. (2012) between 2008 and 2010. They showed that in 250 blood serum samples taken from the population living in the hamlets on the Dal, the average concentration of the pesticide chlorpyrifos was 0.519 ± 0.647 µg/l compared to the very low average concentration of the pesticide of only 0.0008 ± 0.0009 µg/l in a control population.21

Macrophytes and the Emergence of Water Ferns Already at the end of the nineteenth century, when Srinagar had fewer inhabitants than today and the catchment area was sparsely inhabited, large areas of the Dal were covered with waterweeds. As Bellew, who visited the lake in 1873–74, reported, We passed on our way to the Nasim Bagh. The last part of our route wound through that series of canals which intersect the swamps lying between the city and the Dal lake. They are at this season [4 August] nearly choked by the abundance of the water-weeds that shoot up from their shallow bottoms to mature their fruit on the surface, and wither and rot; whilst their tangled meshes obstruct the passage, and poison the air with the stench of the mephitic odours evolved from the festering masses of their luxuriant foliage. (Bellew 1875: 67)

And Duke (1910: 147) described the masses of reeds and floating gardens that cover large portions of the lake: “More than half its surface is covered by belts of gigantic reeds, bulrushes, as well as by floating gardens. The open pieces of water are approached by lanes artificially cut through the reeds.” Then, since at least the middle of the twentieth century, it has been particularly the rooted submerged species Myriophyllum and Ceratophyllum that have proliferated at an increasing rate, so that in summer these plants congest many of the waterways and large parts of the lake. The extreme increase in these weeds is also observed by the lake dwellers, who said that these species were not so abundant some thirty years ago. In principle, submerged macrophyte growth can be understood as a functional interaction of sedimentation and sediment processing. When the water plants die back, this builds up a new layer of sediment in autumn, although most of the nutrients in these layers cannot be utilized by the plants. They only become available for them through processes of mineralization

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and bioturbation. Here, the organic material decomposes with the help of bacteria and other microorganisms, and finally the different phosphorus and nitrogen compounds form that become available to the submerged macrophytes when they sprout in spring (figure 9.10). As mentioned above, the P precipitate, in addition to the phosphate stemming from the decomposed plant biomass, further increases the total amount of nutrients available in the lake’s sediment so that 95 percent of the total pool of major nutrients is locked up in the sediment. It follows from this that phosphate is either deposited in the lake’s sediment or locked up in the plant tissue. A small amount of dissolved P in the water leaves the lake through the Dal Gate into the Jhelum. The concentration of both nutrients—nitrate and phosphate—in the lake’s sediment shows a seasonal fluctuation with a marked reduction in the concentration of both elements during spring and summer when the macrophytes grow and subtract the nutrients from the bottom of the lake. Then, toward autumn, large amounts of the elements are found when the plants decay and return N and P to the sediment. These high concentrations in the sediment remain through the winter and early spring until the newly growing waterweeds absorb them

Figure 9.10. The interrelation between submerged macrophytes, sedimentation, sediment processing, and the availability nutrients. Figure by the author adapted from Barko and James 1998: 199.

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again (Trisal and Kaul 1983). Ishaq and Kaul (1989: 325) concluded on the base of their analysis that macrophytes acting as so called biological mineral nutrient sinks in the lake systemcontain huge amounts of phosphate (3.64 x 106 g) almost equal to that contained in the water . . . although they have been found to hold only about 0.5 percent of the total P pool. The P pool in phytoplankton seems to be very small compared with the macrophytic pool and is thus insignificant in the overall balance, [however], in the Lake Dal, the sediment P pool in the top 10 cm layer was found to be very large . . . accounting for about 99 percent of the total pool (for more details, see also Ishaq and Kaul 1990).

Nowadays, of the total lake area, as Jeelani and Shah (2006: 13) reported, “4.1 km2 is under floating garden or cultivation, 1.51 km2 is submerged land and 2.25 km2 is under marshy conditions.” Recently Badar et al. (2013: 442, table 3; 445) have shown that 3.47 km2 of the lake alone are covered with aquatic macrophytes. Due to the high concentrations of nutrients (mainly accumulated in the lake’s sediment22), these masses of aquatic plants produce an enormous amount of biomass. Handoo and Kaul (1998: 211, table 15.1) reported that the emergents produce 27.6, the floating life forms 8.81, and the submerged species 4.62 tons of dry matter/ha-1 per year,23 with the result that 3.64 tons of P, 86.01 tons of N, 58.12 tons of Ca, 41.45 tons of K, 27.06 tons of Mg, and 8.36 tons of Na are locked up annually in the plants (Kaul et al. 1978). Since the last decades of the twentieth century, with the ever-increasing influx of nutrients from the agricultural areas of the catchment together with the influx of sewage mainly from the city, the households on the Dal islands, and the houseboats and dungas, more and more nutrients, especially P, are accumulating with the result that more, mainly rooted macrophytes can flourish. But with the increasing pollution and eutrophication in many areas of the lake and canals, also masses of the duckweed Lemnea natans and especially the free-floating water fern Salvinia natans have built thick mats that change the light conditions below the surface, thus having a profound influence on the submerged vegetation (Kaul and Bakaya 1976; Zutshi and Vass 1971; Zutshi and Wanganeo 1979). Already in 1976, the masses of especially Salvinia covered 6 percent of the surface of the Dal and 5 percent of Nageen Lake (Zutshi and Vass 1976: 143). In addition, however, a new species of water ferns, namely, Azolla cristata (Burhan et al. 2012, Yousuf 2012) has invaded the lake since 2005. Unlike the rooted plant species, the free-floating ferns Salvinia and Azolla, both called mongol (image 9.2), take up N and P and other nutrients exclusively from the water (Forni et al. 2001).24 In recent years, Salvinia and Azolla25 have proliferated to such an extent that thick layers of them cover many parts of the Dal and Nageen Lakes, but especially the extremely polluted eutrophic waterways in the Old City, so that at times an enormous effort is necessary to pass these regions by boat.

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Image 9.2. The floating ferns: A Salvinia natans plant surrounding Azolla cristata. Photo by the author.

Also, until the middle of the twentieth century, no algae bloom of a significant nature was reported. This is possibly due to the lower availability of nutrients at that time (Kaul 1977; Kaul et al. 1978). Since the last decades of the twentieth century, however, dense algal mats, especially of Oedogonium26 have emerged. These algae start growing as periphyton in early spring on the leaves of the submerged macrophytes. They then proliferate tremendously, detach, emerge, and form large mats on the surface in many regions of the lakes, now usually together with the aquatic ferns. Such masses of algae, mainly observable in the neighborhood of the inhabited islands and raised fields (see the satellite image, figure 5.1), proliferate through the massive influx of nutrients—partly from sewage, partly from the washed-off surplus of chemical fertilizers.27 They then die off at the end of summer, decompose, and add to the nutrient pool of the lake’s sediment. From all the data available, it can be concluded that with a constant high or even growing influx of especially nitrate and phosphate through human activities, more and more of the nutrients will be diluted in the lake’s water and deposited in the sediments, so that more and more water plants can grow and again enlarge the sediment’s phosphate pool after their decay. This feedback leads to the reinforcement of the system so that, if the cycle cannot be interrupted, sooner or later it will cause the complete collapse of the Dal Lake ecosystem. These basic facts summarized and displayed in figure 9.11

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Figure 9.11. The interrelated effects of silting, sewage, aquatic macrophytes, and encroachment. Figure by the author. Note: Additional polluting materials such as polyethylene bags and other solid waste are left out here.

should, however, be understood only as a glimpse into the complex sociocultural factors intermeshed with ecological, mainly hydrological processes. It must be understood that when talking about the ecological situation of Dal Lake, it is always necessary to bear in mind that hydrological conditions differ from region to region, from month to month, and from year to year (Najar and Basheer 2012). All this has been understood and communicated since about the 1980s by many ecologists and institutions concerned with the restoration of the “Pristine Glory of the Dal.” Summarizing, one can only agree with Qadri and Yousuf (2008: 1453) when they stated that this once beautiful water body has been the worst victim of the anthropogenic pressures during the second half of the twentieth century and has undergone tremendous ecological changes. In spite of innumerable conservation measures taken by the management authorities over the past two to three decades, the ecological condition of the lake has deteriorated and it is getting enriched with plant nutrients and other pollutants, becoming more and more infested with macrophytes, getting slowly shallower and shallower and shrinking gradually in size.

Even today, because only a few of the many plans proposed to avoid and curb the amount of sewage have been implemented, and because of the con-

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tinuing growth of the city and the illegal encroachments, one can observe increasing eutrophication and greater growth rates of macrophytes, water ferns, and algae. As the next chapter will show, this is not due primarily to a lack of funding. It is due mainly to mismanagement and, to a great extent, to the application of inadequate methods. Last but not least, however, it is the result of the institutions, stakeholders, and powerful individuals with their different and opposing agendas and interests that often block each other so that no progress is made.

Notes 1. According to Captain Hardwicke, Srinagar had only 562 houses in 1796, “and the

2. 3. 4.

5. 6.

7. 8. 9. 10.

only street was the bazaar that was three-fourths of a mile long” (quoted from Moorcroft and Trebeck 1837/1976: 1:6, fn.). In 1868, the population of Srinagar consisted, according to Lawrence (1895: 223; see also Khan 1978: 32–33n120) of 112,715 persons; and Temple gives a figure of 132,000 for about 1880. In 1891, the number of inhabitants for Srinagar was given as 122,618 (Lawrence 1909: 31). At about the same time, Younghusband (1909/1933: 49) gave a figure of 120,000, and A. Neve (n.d.: 135) estimated 207,000 for 1931. It shows that the city was relatively small and the population fairly constant until about the beginning of the twentieth century. According to the new census of 2011 (CIJK 2011: 89), the population of Srinagar grew 23.56 percent between 2001 and 2011, and 29.51 percent between 1991 and 2001, reaching a total of 1,269,751 individuals in 2011. In his MA thesis in the 1980s, Ruhee (1985: 15) wrote that 1,329 dungas were moored on the Dal, hosting 8,688 individuals; that is, 6.5 persons per boat. See also Moorcroft (MS EUR D.265, p. 63). Already in 1985 there was a demand that “unscientific cultivation along mountain slopes must be stopped. Even such methods as contour farming should be disallowed” (Wakhlu 1985: 14). DRP (2000: vol. 2, pt. 1, p. 255) gave the number of pacca (massive) houses at 4,210 and of huts at 3,493. This effect has been recognized since the second half of the last century. It has been shown that natural as well as constructed wetlands remove not only different nutrients from lacustrine systems but also toxic compounds from domestic and industrial sewage (Billore 1990, 1998; Billore and Sharma 1996; Brix and Schierup 1989). The southern and southeastern part, the Boulevard Road, and a first segment east of the Dal Lake were constructed in the 1930s (Trisal 1987: 45). The Lakes and Waterways Development Authority (LAWDA) was founded in 1997. It was only in April 2018 that the government declared the tourist spots in the valley and in Ladakh to be a “polythene free zone” (Kashmir Times 21.04.2018). Already in 1988, Zuchi and Khan (p. 350) reported on the differences in hydrological data collected inshore and offshore of the Dal.

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11. These figures are relatively low in comparison to those published by Kaul (1977), Kaul et al. (1978), and Trisal (1987).

12. For a general discussion on the conductivity data of the Dal, see Pandit (1999: 73–76).

13. But it is also present with smaller amounts of ammonia (NH4+) and nitrite (NO2-). 14. No wonder that the analysis of the Dal water by the New England Research Institute

15. 16. 17.

18.

19.

20. 21.

22.

23. 24. 25.

(NERI) “has shown that 72 to 80 percent of the samples boast good quality water and 5 percent of the samples consist of ‘bad’ water. . . . Reports have also underlined that all resource depletion and eutrophic damages are restricted to 20 percent of the lake” (Kashmir Observer 22.06.2014). These 20 percent relate to the highly populated and congested parts of the Dal. For their identification, I thank Anna Busch. For a meticulous study of the chemical characteristics of the bottom sediments of Dal Lake, see Mushtaq et al. (2015). Based on data collected between September 1999 and August 2000, Solim and Wanganeo (2007: 3) reported a total phosphorus and nitrogen loading of the Dal Lake in the order of 86.47 tons yr-1 and 592.72 tons yr-1 respectively. Depending on the different proposed input levels (between 0.11 and 30.0 kg × person-1 × yr-1). For the proposed minimal input assumption, an increment from 20.3 to 28.6 × 106 g; and for the maximal input assumption, an increment from 55.5 to 78.0 × 106 g was calculated. All over India, the use of chemical fertilizers—mainly urea (NH2 CONH2)—grew exponentially between 1960 and 1992 (Agrawal et al. 1999: 71, fig. 1), and this is also true for the agricultural lands in the catchment area of the Dal. For the hydrological determinants of the Dal Lake’s water quality, see Kanakiya et al. (2014). Overexposure to chlorpyrifos can lead to dermatological and respiratory complications and, in acute cases, to neurological and kidney problems. According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Act (EPA, 2014), the acceptable dose is 0.3 micrograms/ kg/day. The sediment provides up to 72 percent of all the phosphorus taken up by aquatic macrophytes during growth (Carignan and Kalff 1980: 987), whereby according to Smith and Adams (1986: 1312), the yearly uptake of P in Myriophyllum is 3.0 g P m-2. However, as shown by Madsen (2002), many species such as Elodea and Potamogeton are able to satisfy their demand for minerals by leaf nutrient uptake alone. For the dense submerged macrophytic population, Solim and Wanganeo (2007: 6) reported 3.20 kg m2 and a total fresh biomass of 43.852 t. See also Zutshi and Vass (1976) and Uheda et al. (1999). For the protein contents and the use of a related species (Azolla pinnata) as feed for ruminants, see Khare et al. (2014) and Parashuramulu et al. (2013). For the nutritional value and the use of the different macrophytes of the Dal for animal feed, see Rather and Nazir (2015). For Azolla pinnata accumulating heavy metals, see Shafi et al. (2015); and for its use to produce green manure, see Lumpkin and Plucknett (1980, 1982).

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26. For a list of the different genera and species of phyto- and zooplankton, see Pandit et al. (2014), Raina and Vass (1993), Trisal (1987: 49–50), Vass (1980: 14), or Zutshi and Ticku (1990). 27. This high load of nutrients also induced the outbreaks of so-called “red tide” (caused by the flagellate Euglena pedunculata) observed since 1991 mainly along the southeastern part of the Dal in the shallow waters along the Boulevard Road (Khan 2000, Shafiq-ur-Rehman 1988).

10  The Political Ecology of a Degrading Lake A Paradise Lost? Preamble To avoid succumbing to the temptation of overestimating and possibly giving a biased report by describing, analyzing, and interrelating the ecological, economic, and sociopolitical factors contributing to the degradation of Dal Lake solely on the basis of my own observations and the many narratives and rumors that have come to my ears, I have decided to use the numerous reports published by concerned scientists and journalists in the most important Kashmir dailies and quote these mainly verbatim. In the following, if not indicated otherwise, the abbreviations GK, KO, KR, and KT refer to Greater Kashmir, Kashmir Observer, Kashmir Reader, and Kashmir Times respectively. The articles quoted, but also those I have additionally consulted, are cited in appendix A.

Countermeasures: Proposals and Deficiencies Since Blaikie’s (1985) and Blaikie and Brookfield’s (1987) seeding publications on “Political Ecology” a multitude of books, written mainly by geographers, have concentrated on the relationship between environmental

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change and the larger society (for more recent work, see, e.g., Neumann 2005; Perreault, Bridge, and McCarthy 2015). Based on their theoretical approach, in this chapter, the endeavor of the Kashmir political parties, the related governmental departments and the various stakeholders to save the degrading Dal Lake, is described. Nonetheless, due to ignorance, mismanagement, and corruption over many decades, the degradation and eutrophication of the lake continues to this day, and is even accelerating. All information reflected in the following has to be viewed against the legal background on environmental issues (Water Prevention Act, India, 1974, and Environmental Protection Act, India, 1986) as presented in detail by Arfat and Ali (2013: 5): The Supreme Court of India and High Court have given teeth to these laws by hearing public interest writ petitions that seek implementation of measures to prevent water pollution. . . . The public trust doctrine primarily rests on the principle that certain resources like air, sea, water and forests are of such a great importance to the people as a whole that it would be wholly unjustified to make them a subject of private ownership. The said resources being a gift of nature, they should be made freely available to everyone irrespective of the status in life. . . . Thus, the public trust is an affirmation of the duty of the state to protect the people’s common heritage of streams, lakes, marshlands and tidelands. The State has an affirmative duty to take public trust into account in the planning and allocation of water resources and to protect public trust whenever feasible. The aesthetic use and pristine beauty of the natural resources, the environment and the ecosystem cannot be permitted to be eroded for private, commercial, or any other use unless the courts find it necessary, in good faith, for the public good and in the public interest to encroach upon the said resources. . . . The Environment [Protection] Act 1986 as well as the Water Act 1974 are equally applicable to Jammu and Kashmir.

In previous chapters, I have shown that all relevant ecological data, and especially the limnologic and hydrologic data, on the degradation of Dal Lake have been well known for many decades. Moreover, since the 1970s, as cited above, laws have been passed that, if enforced, would not have allowed the Dal to degrade to the dramatic level now causing such concern. Already in 1985, Rajiv Saxena published an article in the Indian Express reporting that experts at the National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA), commissioned by the J & K government, had recommended the following measures to save the Dal: 1. Restricting entry of excreta in the lake by modifying the catchment. 2. Constructing a settling basin outside the lake to trap the bulk of the sediment load in the Telbal Nala. 3. Weed harvesting in the open water areas of the lake and their disposal in the floating gardens.1

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4. Rearranging the mooring pattern of houseboats so that weeds can be removed to promote better water circulation. 5. Providing a sewage pipe in the bed of the lake to serve houseboats. Unfortunately, however, many of these plans were put into operation only half-heartedly or very slowly—last but not least due to funding problems. In 1998, Praveen Swami (1998b: 61) reported in Frontline that despite Farooq Abdullah’s personal backing, the Rs. 294 crores needed to clean up the lake, and Rs. 185 crores for the rehabilitation of its residents, has not materialized. In 1997, with the backing of Prime Minister H. D. Gowda, Abdullah persuaded the Planning Commission to meet the clean-up costs. That money, however, is yet to materialize.

Some years later, in collaboration with the different institutions concerned, these recommendations were modified, and the DPR (2000) proposed the following measures to curb the ongoing degradation of the lake and counteract the accelerating pollution of the Dal: 1. Clearing Srinagar’s sewage to reduce the influx of nitrogen and phosphorus with the help of sewage treatment plants (STPs). 2. Rehabilitating lake dwellers to curb the lake’s pollution. 3. Realigning houseboats to connect them with the sewage system. 4. Renaturalizing illegal encroachments. 5. Demolishing illegal constructions within two hundred meters of the lake’s shore. 6. Eradicating waterweeds mechanically with harvesters. To understand in more detail why, despite having now spent thousands of crore rupees on reconstituting the “pristine glory of the Dal,” the pollution of the lake nonetheless continues and degradation has even accelerated, I have analyzed the more than four hundred relevant articles (and I surely have missed some) published mainly in the four most important Kashmir dailies. As can be seen from figure 10.1, more and more journalists and ecologists have addressed the problem over the years, so that the number of articles written in these Kashmiri dailies increased from 2002 to 2014, but declined both in 2015 after the devastating flood in September 2014 and again in 2017 after months of unrest. Many of these articles are structured in a similar way: After describing the once sublime beauty for which Dal Lake was known all over the world, the authors lament the accelerating degradation of the lake, often referring to ecological data published in many reports and scientific journals. Then, the majority asks where the enormous amount of money provided to save

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Figure 10.1. The rise in the number of articles published in Greater Kashmir, Kashmir Times, and Kashmir Observer. Figure by the author. Note: There was a decrease in Dal-related articles after the devastating flood in September 2014, when disaster-related problems had priority, and later during the unrests in 2017, when the valley was often under curfew and siege.

the lake has gone and emphasizes the inefficiency and corruption of governmental institutions. Thus, for instance, the National Conference (NC) has blamed the government agencies for a lack of policy and asked what has been done for the 3,027 lakh rupees spent in two years (GK 18.03.2006). Over the years, the central government in Delhi had assigned 298 crore rupees for pollution control to save the lake, but the “government is not serious enough; money is spent only on ‘cosmetic surgery’” (GK 31.03.2008). It was also stated that “despite measures taken by LAWDA there is no improvement” (GK 06.05.2008), and it was demanded that “the leadership must understand the people’s will” (GK 04.10.2008). Already in 2007, the Environmental Committee of the J & K Legislative Assembly issued strict instructions to the Lakes and Waterways Development Agency (LAWDA) and underscored the need for a well-knit program for the rehabilitation of lake dwellers (GK 14.09.2007). In 2009, it was again stated that the approach to the restoration of the Dal was ineffective and that the “ineffectiveness of government, over the years can be matched equally, if not more, by the collective apathy of the stakeholders” (GK 06.07.2009). Again in 2010, the government was asked

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to “show seriousness in preserving Dal” (GK 06.02.2010), and in GK (05.06.2010) we read, “Despite all the restauration plans since 1971, there is no improvement,” and, “LAWDA bluntly ignored all the recommendations” (GK 25.11.2010). Further on, it is stated clearly that “from the year one every effort and step towards Dal conservation was laden with loads of nepotism and corrupt mind-set” (GK 19.04.2011). As will be seen in the following, most of the articles in Kashmir dailies mention corruption on all levels when tackling the problems of the Dal. It should be kept in mind that according to Transparency International (T.I. 2016), India ranks 80th out of 180 countries with a CPI value2 of 40, and is the third most corrupt of the five BRICS nations (KO 12.01.2016). Furthermore, among the Indian states, Jammu and Kashmir State enjoying the special status as the most corrupt in the country. Jammu and Kashmir contributes approximately 0.76 per cent to national GDT and is ranked second in the list of highest grant receiving states of the country. (KO 12.01.2016)

Attempts to Save the Lake In the following, I shall analyze the five most important attempts of the authorities to “Save the Lake” in more detail. First, I shall describe the four enterprises, addressing 1. the establishment of sewage treatment plants (STPs) to clean the sewage mainly from Srinagar and 2. the de-weeding of the masses of water plants with the help of harvesters. I shall then, after a short theoretical digression on “political ecology,” describe the government’s plans and ventures to 3. compensate and resettle Dal dwellers away from the lake, 4. realign houseboats in order to connect them to a sewage system, and 5. remove and renaturalize encroachments on the lake and demolish houses and stalls built illegally closer than two hundred meters to the lake’s shore.

Implementation of Sewage Treatment Plants The most important suggestion for improving the situation was to set up sewage treatment plants (STPs). Some had been installed already in the 1980s, but these have outlived their utility as new technologies have become available in recent years (Touseef A. Bhat, “KASHMIR CONCERN,” pers. comm. 17.06.2016). In the 1990s, their installation was meant to clear the

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city’s sewage of nitrogen3 and phosphate before discharging the water into the Dal (DPR 2000: vol. 2, part 1, p. 557a). It was also proposed that the 105 mohallahs on the Dal should be grouped into eight zones that would then be provided with sanitation units—as either individual or community toilets. From these units, the sewage would be brought to nearby locations by either gravity or pumping and then treated in small units of fluidized aerobic bioreactors (FABs). This proposal, however, was never considered. Instead, STPs were installed to treat only sewage from the city. When the first STPs were installed, it quickly became obvious that they were unable to handle the ecological challenges of the lake. In response to critical articles already published in the Kashmiri newspapers in 2009 under the headline “Why has LAWDA failed to clean up the Dal Lake?” the eminent Kashmiri ecologist Muhammad Rashid-ud-Din Kundangar stated, I am of the firm opinion that the present Sewage Treatment System is a failure and disastrous for both Dal and Nageen lake and in near future the condition of the Nageen lake will be as that of the Brarinambal (it will turn into a stinking cesspool). My scientific observations on the basis of independent monitoring and surveillance is confirmed by the recent status report of State Pollution Control Board (May–July, 2009) and it bears testimony to the fact that the Dal waters are deteriorating at an alarming rate due to malfunctioning of STP’s and with drastic changes in physico-chemical parameters, biodiversity and perpetual obnoxious algal blooms. The onus of failures of Dal lake conservation program solely lies on the so called Consultants of Roorkee and the temporarily hired experts who have managed their entry through foul means and also for advocating for adoption of STP’s, proven as failure under Kashmir climatic conditions. (KashmirForum.org 29.10.2009)

Also in the same blog, Khurshid Ahmed Naqib commented, Despite concerns expressed by the Union Ministry, LAWDA in August 2004 allotted the construction of three STPs at Hazratbal, Laam (Nishat) and Habak to a private firm at a cost of Rs 8.90 crores with the scheduled date of completion as May 2005. Out of the three STPs, the ones at Hazratbal and Habak had been commissioned during February and April 2006, the report said. In October 2006, LAWDA claimed that the STPs were working efficiently and that the Dal Lake’s health would improve after all the STPs were completed and commissioned. However, according to an analytical report of the research and monitoring division of LAWDA in August 2006, the concentration of some of the nutrients present in the waste water increased at the outflow stage vis-à-vis inflow stage despite receiving treatment at STPs.

In the following years, criticism was not only leveled at the delay in constructing the STPs but also at their efficacy. On 19 October 2012, a panel of the Committee on Estimates (CE) of the J & K Legislative Assembly

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directed officers of H&UDD to gear up their filed functionaries for speeding up the pace of work on all ongoing projects including Sewage Treatment Plants (STPs) taken in hand for conservation of Dal Lake and complete them in a stipulated time frame. The Committee observed that the money allocated for the conservation and development of Dal Lake should be utilized properly and judiciously. (KO 19.10.2012)

But despite these and similar criticisms published in the Kashmir dailies, there was no substantial change in strategy. Over the next years, sewage treatment plants with a capacity to treat 5.4 million liters of sewage per day were constructed by LAWDA through Thermax India (Ltd) at a cost of 12 crore rupees. But in March 2013,4 it was again reported that they worked only with a questionable effect: Three STPs based on Fluidized Aerobic Bio-reactor (FAB) technology have already been constructed at Hazratbal, Nishat, and Habak. However, officials said that FAB can’t wholly treat nitrogen and phosphorous that facilitate [the] growth of obnoxious weeds in Dal Lake. (GK 20.03.2013)

Some months later, an editorial in KT (23.11.2013) again questioned the efficacy of the STPs: The report goes on to point out that their efficacy has already been under shadow in cold regions of the country . . . it was also discerned that charges of acute corruption and nepotism in the Lakes and Waterways Development Authority (LAWDA) have been threatening to bog down the working of the new department since its inception.

Albeit all these criticisms and admonitions, nothing changed, so that one year later, the cleaning capacity of the STPs was questioned again. It was now evident that the FAB technology was not designed to undertake denitrification that would allow an increased flow of nitrates to contribute to the prolific growth of waterweeds, necessitating the annual removal of more than one million cubic meters from the Dal, incurring expenditure of lakhs of rupees. It was then reported, On the direction of the Jammu and Kashmir High Court, a team of scientists from the National Environment Engineering Research Institute (NEERI) had last year evaluated functioning of FAB based STPs around the lake. . . . [and had] recommended several short-term and long term measures including upgradation of FAB-based STPs to improve efficiency. (GK 22.03.2014)

Apart from the general problem as to whether the technology chosen is adequate for cleaning Srinagar’s sewage, the completion of the plants was also deferred again and again. As D. A. Rashid reported, the High Court of J & K approached the vice chairman of LAWDA and criticized that,

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on one hand[,] . . . LAWDA spends millions of rupees on de-weeding operations, manually as well as mechanically, and on the other, thousands of tons of manure and fertilizers in shape of urban and agricultural runoffs are allowed to flow into the lake. (GK 06.05.2014)

It was hoped that the STP technology would work satisfactorily, but as can be seen from images 10.1a,b, some of them were hardly still functioning or not working at all in the years 2015–17. Already in May 2014, it was not clear whether the water quality of the Dal had changed under the influence of the STPs. Shafa’atr Rasool, who works in J & K State Pollution Control Board (PCB), criticized several governmental agencies for engaging in water quality monitoring of the Dal for the last few decades but not making data available to ascertain whether there has been any considerable change in water quality of the lake. He remarked that LAWDA figures showed that 5.5 tons of phosphorus and 88.9 tons of nitrogen drained into Dal each year before the installation of the STPs. Now, as he observed, Under the Dal Lake Conservation Plan, the same load of sewage influx has been diverted to the STPs and is now released into the water body after “treatment.” But the efficiency, or inefficiency of the treatment plants has put a question mark on the entire conservation plan of more than 3,000 million. (GK 14.05.2014)

Still in May 2016, only four FAB-based STPs were operational (at Lam, Nishat, Habak, and Hazratbal). Of the other two, which are based on sequential batch reactor (SBR) technology,5 the one that was under trial at Nallah Amir Khan is now running. The other at Brarinambal is in the final stages of completion but is not yet commissioned (A. Touseef, A. Bhat “Kashmir Concern,” pers. comm. 12.06.2016). In the hope that the execution of the project “Save the Lake” would be more effective, the Committee on the Environment was informed that the conservation project had now been taken under the National Lake Conservation Project (NLCP) at a cost of Rs 248 crore out of the 298.96 crore that had been spent until then (GK 06.10.2015). One year later, following a committee meeting in May (KT 16.05.2016), the High Court directed a monitoring committee to evolve a permanent mechanism for preserving and protecting Kashmiri lakes; and in June, the High Court asked the state government to comply with all its orders passed regarding the preservation and protection of Dal Lake and other bodies in the state (KT 02.06.2016, also 08.08.2016). But all the different criticisms and endeavors were of no avail. Neither the regular checking of the lake’s water was performed nor the efficacy of the STPs examined properly. Thus, in March 2016, the “senior advocate

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Images 10.1a, b. A sewage treatment plant installed in about 2013 east of the Nagen Lake. Photo by the author. Note: Until 2015, this plant never or rarely operated, and it was filled with polythene bags and other rubbish. Then, in August 2017, I was told that it now worked from time to time.

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Z. A. Shah, amicus curiae, stated that the PCB forgets the directions regarding checking of all STPs at regular intervals.” Also it was made public that “the Court-appointed vigilance commissioners—Mohammad Shafi Khan . . . and Abdul Hamid Bhat . . . have already pointed out that the three STPs are on the verge of collapse and are not effective in preventing addition of pollutants to the Lake” (KT 03.02.2016). All these problems and controversies had already started shortly after the decision to acquire a specific STP technology, and they continued after the installation of the first STPs. The managerial decision to construct the FAB-based technology was not the outcome of a process in which a board of specialists meticulously discussed the different technical possibilities on an international level against the backdrop of the specific situation of the Dal and then selected the optimal method and technology. The decision finally taken, many say, was the outcome of the mutual interests of an entangled influential corporate sector, stakeholders, and politicians who realized a maximal profit for themselves.6 As Touseef A. Bhat (“Kashmir Concern,” pers. comm. 17.06.2016) commented, The STP technology that had been finally chosen by the Government [that] keeps its own council while taking crucial decisions ignoring the solid technical advice rendered by the experts with proven credentials . . . who explains the malfunctioning of 3 of the 5 STPs under LAWDA domain.

About a year later, nothing had really changed, and the Jammu and Kashmir High Court came “down heavily on the caretaker body Lakes and Waterways Department Authority (LAWDA), and the civil administration for their lax approach and insufficient staff.” Noting that existing sewage treatment plants “were not functioning effectively and needed to be upgraded,” the court said: “Re-structuring and refurnishing of existing STPs should also be examined” (The Hindu 27.04.2017). In their thorough analysis of the situation of the lake, Guru and Patloo (2017) wrote that the STPs, at Brarinambal do not work to the full capacity as these are shut down due to irregular power supply, most of the time. It has been observed that a large volume of sewage collected by the pumping stations at the Boulevard is discharged untreated into chunticul near Dalgate Bridge rather than carrying it to Brarinambal for treatment and final disposal. (KT 14.04.2017)

They also stated that a huge amount of untreated sewage is also been flown into Dal Lake through gravity drains on the Boulevard during power cuts or during mechanical breakdown. . . . [It] cannot be denied that the future of our precious water resources is bleak and that we are heading for a catastrophe. The disaster is inevitable. (KT 14.04.2017)

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When the State Pollution Control Board (SPCB) submitted a report in October 2017 criticizing that, according to the samples, the existing STPs were not functioning within permissible limits, the High Court directed that the existing STPs should be upgraded and proposed two new STPs of 30 MLD (million liters per day) capacity (KO 26.10.2017). Furthermore, it can be assumed that the situation will become more dramatic in future years, because as predicted in the Draft Master Plan: Srinagar Metropolitan Region—2035 (DMPS 2017: 15), “At present the city limits stand at 416 sq. km and with the new addition the city will expand up to 766 sq. km.” Therefore, the environmental and pollution problems will increase dramatically if the sewage network is not planned properly and solved well enough in advance.

Mechanical Eradication of Waterweeds with Harvesters Handoo and Kaul (1998: 212) reported that, Owing largely to the availability of favourable nutrients and depth regime in the Dal lake, macrophyting production estimated to be 30 tonnes ha-1 during 1970–72 (Kaul 1977) has increased to 41.03 tonnes ha-1 during 1972–76 (Zutshi and Vass 1982). The estimates given by Kaul et al. (1978) are still higher and according to Vass (1980) the macrophyte production ranges between 30–150 tonnes ha-1.

Two harvesters7 were imported from Switzerland in 1984 and another two in 1986 to cope with the problem of the exponential growth rate of waterweeds caused by the high concentration of mainly phosphate and nitrate in the lake. The idea was that using these harvesters to mechanically eradicate water plants (image 10.2)—mainly Ceratophyllum, Myriophyllum, and the floating ferns Azolla and Salvinia—would have a substantial effect by removing the nutrients locked inside the plant tissue from the lake. In fact, as, for example, Meuleman et al. (2004: 459) had shown experimentally in a ditch system, [for] both nutrients (P and N), harvesting the aquatic vegetation in September was the main removal mechanism from the ditch system with 92 kg of nitrogen (80 percent of annual input N) and 14 kg of phosphorus (95 percent of annual P input).

Removing the aquatic vegetation before it rots in autumn would prevent it from adding to the nutrients already stored in the lake’s sediment layer. Thus, in principle, a rigorous harvesting of the water plants could help to remove nutrients from the lake, and this would also have the advantage that the plant matter collected could be transported by trucks to a place for

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Image 10.2. Mechanical cutting of waterweeds with a harvester. Photo by the author.

composting, as has been done in recent years. The compost can then be purchased by regional farmers to fertilize their fields (Pandit 1984). For two reasons, however, the available harvesters have had very little effect. First, they do not operate according to a regular schedule, and due to a lack of fuel or spare parts, only one or two out of four harvesters (two are about fifteen years old and barely usable) can be deployed. Therefore, in the tourist season, when the ways to the houseboats on, for instance, Nageen Lake are blocked by enormous masses of waterweeds, it is often the case that a harvester comes only after the owners of boats have made extensive complaints. Because the harvesters are utilized only now and then, the removal of nutrients from the system with this method is negligible, albeit as reported in GK (22.03.2014): “Each year more than 1,000,000 cubic meters of weeds are removed from the lake, incurring expenditure of lakhs of rupees.” In their diligent one-year analysis (1986–87), Zutshi and Ticku (1990: 425) concluded, No visible improvement in the Dal Lake environment was observed although mechanical harvesting has been in operation for the last three years. This is mainly caused because harvesting operations are not carried out under a definite schedule and time frame. There are ample indications that harvesting does not affect the overall stability of the system.

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Second, and even more important, the harvesters operate mainly in the time of the weed’s maximal growth rate and cut only the stems of the plants about 1.5 meters under the water’s surface. As Zutshi and Ticku (1990; see also Zhang et al. 2014) have reported, the most abundant rooted species, Ceratophyllum and Myriophyllum, revegetate in about three to four weeks after weeding. I also observed this when on the lake in summer. It would be quite different if harvesters were to be used to eradicate the plants together with their roots. Then, as shown by Velu (1976: 239), a partial regeneration takes place only after five to six months and a complete regeneration only after eight to nine months. If, in addition, this were to be done at the end of the waterweed’s vegetation cycle in November, the method would have a more long-lasting effect. Another menace is the growing abundance of the yellow variety of water lilies. When the major flood in September 2014 uprooted many of them, scattering them over large areas of Dal Lake, they multiplied tremendously. As the vice chairman of LAWDA reported, eight machines and 250 persons were put in place to carry out the removal of water lilies (GK 17.07.2017). However, as was obvious at the end of August of that year, a considerable effect was not to be seen. As Pandit had already pointed out, “As long as the massive influx of nutrients is not curbed, so that an appropriate balance between the rates of input of pollutants, plants growth and harvesting is not reached, the erratic decrementing of waterweeds, without the eradication of their roots, is rather useless and a waste of money” (1984: 75). But in 2016, (see chapter 9, figures 9.9a–d ), as the water lilies encroached into most parts of the lake, this problem could then only be solved with a new type of harvester and an enormous input of labor. Some publications (e.g., Chaudhuri et al. 1976) indicate that there were also plans to introduce the Chinese grass carp (Ctenophryngodon idella), which was thought to be mainly herbivorous and would feed on the water plants. But when it was found that only a relatively small portion of this carp’s food consists of these plants (Shafi et al. 2012), the plan was dropped. Another idea was to introduce a North American weevil that specifically destroys Myriophyllum (Creed and Sheldon 1995), but this plan was also finally rejected. In 2017, people told me that in the northern part of Nageen Lake, some chemicals were sprayed in secret. They said that the water turned green and that the water plants rotted. However, I was unable to verify these rumors. Other plans to reduce pollution and the growth of waterweeds included resettling the market gardeners away from the lake and shifting many of the tourist houseboats clustered in the southern part of the Dal to other places because they were thought to be among the main polluters of the Dal. These resettlement plans caused serious problems for the members of

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both communities. For the families involved, the sites where they live do not just comprise the economic basis of their well-being. Many have lived there for generations, and their “spaces and places” are endowed with a sense of home—with historical memories and feelings of attachment.

“Space” and “Place” From a “bioecological” perspective, one usually talks about an “environment” or especially an “ecosystem” and its distinguishable parts, the “habitats” that entail subjects (e.g., a species) to which they are allocated. They can refer to a swamp as a frog’s habitat or a city as a human habitat—with, of course, the numerous “subhabitats,” the “niches.” However, as human ecologists, we have to go beyond this scope and broaden the basic “bioperspective” to include the “culture” factor. Apart from this classification, since about the beginning of the twentyfirst century, the placing, the situatedness, or, to use the neologism, the “spatializing” of culture has become a topic in anthropology (Low 2009) and sociology (Gieryn 2000). Until today, umpteen publications have been written that strive for definitions to delineate the two terms “place” and “space.” Next to more or less similar attempts by different authors, Low (2017: 32) recently gave the following definition: I consider space to be the more general and abstract construct retaining its social production and materialist origins. Space, in my rendering, is preeminently social, produced by bodies and groups of people as well as historical and political forces. Place is used in the sense of a space that is inhabited and appropriated through the attribution of personal and group meanings, feelings, sensory perceptions and understandings. . . . It is the spatial location of subjectivities, intersubjectivities and identities that transform space into places—that is, the lived spaces of human and nonhuman importance.

Low (2017: 94) also went on to speak generally about “embodied space,” which integrates body/space/culture and connects microanalyses of individual bodies and place-making to macro-analyses of physical place-making to macro-analyses of social, economic and political forces. Embodied space addresses both the experiential and material aspects of the body in space as well as the merging of body/space as a location that can communicate, transform and contest social structures.

These and similar definitions comprise either the coming into being of a place or the state of a place in a moment of time. However, as Foucault (1984: 1) remarked,

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Yet it is necessary to notice that the space that today appears to form the horizon of our concerns, our theory, or systems, is not an innovation; space itself has a history in Western experience, and it is not possible to disregard the fatal intersection of time with space. One could say, by way of retracing this history of space very roughly, that in the Middle Ages there was a hierarchic ensemble of places: sacred places and profane places: protected places and open, exposed places: urban places and rural places (all these concern the real life of men).

This aspect of time was also accented by Low (2017: 34) when she spoke about the “Social Production of Space” that “illuminates how a place or space comes into existence [italics added]” and opens up questions about the political, economic, and historical motives of its planning and development. It is particularly these themes that are the focus of a “Sociology of Space and Place.” Gieryn (2000: 465) has pointed out that a “place is space filled up by people, practice, objects, and representations.” In practice, such or similar definitions and the theoretical distinction and relationship between the two terms “space” and “place” has always constituted the basis for ethnographic descriptions and analyses of observed facts. Here, as Low (2017: 207) also remarked, The social construction of space is mediated by language as a semiotic system— directly and indirectly—connects space with personal, social, cultural and political meanings and memories. The centrality of language in place-making requires greater attention to the ways that language functions to identify, produce and transform space. . . . Language analysis is a crucial part of any special analysis because of its role in framing the experience of place, reconfiguring social relations and facilitating and constraining material outcomes.

But all of her examples deal with urban settings in which Western languages are employed,8 and as she (2017: 120–22) reported, only a very few publications deal with an analysis of toponyms—the emic perspectives, meanings, and values people in nonurban contexts relate to regions and ranges they inhabit and/or use. Possibly, the use of the Western concepts of “space and place” make no sense in non-Western and/or “traditional” societies. This problem will become apparent in the next paragraph in which I address populations in a non-Western cultural context and in a nonurban environment.

Dal Dwellers’ “Spaces” and “Places” Chapters 5, 6, and 8 have described how Dal Lake, over time, became fractionated into different regions and sites inhabited and used by lake dwellers with different economic specializations. Here, each group attributes specific meanings to the respective “spaces” and “places.” Some relate to their his-

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tory and identity; others may comprise the economic, the utilitarian values known to economists as “use values” (e.g., sources of food production); and yet others may refer to the surrounding environment endowed with scenic beauty, the aesthetic values (for a comprehensive overview and discussion of “values,” see Dasgupta 2001). If we try to ascribe the etic concepts of “space” and “place” as formulated or defined by Western scientists to the emic concepts and terminologies used by the people on the Dal that bear relations to their culture-specific “being in the world,”9 serious semantic problems arise. If the lingua franca Urdu is used, the term jāygāh without further significations can usually denote an area, a space, as well as a place. However, it is even more problematic when Kashmiri is spoken: it has hundreds of terms at its command that are either toponyms that often refer not only to local characteristics or to sites with symbolic/religious relevance but also to either the spatial relation between things or even specific “spaces of time.” Grierson and Shastrie’s Dictionary of the Kashmiri Language (1916/1932) records more than fifty entries under the heading “space,” and more than five hundred entries, including many toponyms, are found under “place.”10 Nonetheless, in order to relate the significance of localizable parts of the Dal environment endowed with meanings and values by the Dal Lake dwellers to the political and economic forces impinging on them, one can start with two basic definitions. Quoting Low (2017: 32), “space and place” are “imagine[d] as a continuum of global to intimate interrelations (Massey 2005) or as a range of geographical scales from the surface of the earth to an architectural structure (Smith 1984).” Here, with the “continuum,” the whole of Dal Lake will be understood as a common space shared more or less intensively by all Dal dwellers. “Intimate interrelations” will be understood especially as the market gardeners’ settlements, the “architectural structures,” the houses on the islands and semi-islands, and the agricultural areas next or around their homes. The raised fields, the floating and lotus gardens farther away from their homes in the open water, may be understood as their “second-order places.” The lake as “space” is for them only a region they have to traverse to reach these and other “spaces.” For the owners of tourist houseboats living on the Dal, the features attached to their individual “places” differ from those of the market gardeners, because their “place” constitutes only their boat and usually a small attached pile-constructed house (see image 7.5). For the market gardeners, their value is their acreage, and the vegetables they grow are their capital that has to be converted into cash. For the owners of houseboats, who extract money from tourists, their capital, next to their boats, is constituted by the common “space” of the lake whose value comprises the scenic beauty the tourists come to “consume” (Potocka 2013).

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The fishers used to be a primarily itinerant population, whose families lived mainly on their boats that were their “floating places” on the lake that was their “space.” Then, with the beginning of a phase of sedentarization in the early twentieth century, houses on stilts became their “localizable places” (see image 8.1). But they still lived largely from fishing, and the Dal was still their “space.” Now, for about fifty years, due to the declining fish population, fishing has become less important. Many are now resettled, and the new houses built for them have become their new “places.” Most members of this community now occupy different economic niches in their new “space,” the capital of Srinagar (for details, see chapter 8). For some decades now, especially under the project “Save the Lake,” all the Dal dwellers’ “places” have become contested, because the government blames them for being a major cause for the degradation of the lake. As Low and Lawrence-Zúñiga (2003: 18) define it, “contesting places” are characterized by social conflicts that are focused on particular sites [defined] as geographical locations where conflicts in the form of opposition, confrontation, subversion and/or resistance engage actors whose social positions are defined by differential control of resources and access to power.

Contesting the Dal Dwellers’ “Places” It can be said that, implicitly, the only people for whom the lake is of merely unselfish interest are those individuals and groups of activists advocating the restitution of the “pristine glory of the Dal.” For all other parties involved, political and especially economic aspects play a major role, and this often interferes with an optimal strategy to “save the lake.” Whereas for many institutions, stakeholders, and politicians, it is especially or even solely economic interests that govern their behavior; for the Dal dwellers, it is their traditional way of life that is basic for their well-being. It is solely a space in which certain projects have to be executed. Furthermore, influential families and rich individuals from Srinagar create or have already occupied a “place” by illegally encroaching within the forbidden two-hundred-meter zone at the lake’s shore, often through dumping filling material into the shallow water of the lake on which they can then construct houses, restaurants, or shops. For a long time, the institutions entrusted with the “Save the Dal Project” have asserted and proclaimed that the Dal dwellers are one of the main sources and reasons for the lake’s degradation. Therefore, it was considered important to remove many of the market gardeners from their places and resettle them away from the lake. Moreover, realigning many of the houseboats at a new location called Dole Demb (see map 5.1 and figure 9.9d) and

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connecting them to a sewage system would be a major step toward reestablishing an ecological equilibrium. Thus, all the traditional “places” of the Dal dwellers, including the illegally created ones in which buildings were constructed within the “green belt” adjacent to the lake, are contested.

Contesting the Market Gardeners’ Place Surely, the main cause for the progressive degradation of Dal Lake is the constant or even increasing influx of nutrients from Srinagar’s uncleaned sewage. However, sewage and especially chemical fertilizer and pesticides also reach the lake from the catchment areas where more and more of the forest lands have been cleared and settlements and agricultural land have emerged over the last decades. Despite strict laws, this has hardly ever been taken into account, as ascertained in a KT editorial: It will not be out of place to mention that despite having stringent laws to protect forests, violations have been going on unabated due to political pressure from politicians and influential forest lessees, who have made fortunes from felling trees and indiscriminate exploitation of forest resources with sanction and active connivance of politicians, who rule the roost in successive governments in J & K over the past more than half a century. (KT 30.05.2016)

Because the vegetable gardeners’ income correlates positively with the acreage at their disposal, many have enlarged their fields illicitly over the years by encroaching deeper into the lake or by constructing raised fields near their island that, after some years, merge with their island. These now enlarged islands can also serve for the construction of houses and other structures that can be rented to families who are not involved in gardening but earn their living in the city; and on some of them even small guesthouses, restaurants, and workshops have been constructed. When around the middle of the twentieth century the ecological problems of the Dal were first discussed, it was thought that the Dal dwellers and others who have encroached into the lake’s riparian zone were the main polluters of the water body. As Atkins Planning Consultants (APC/ODA 1989: 142), an agency commissioned to look into the lake’s degradation problem, stated, For more than twenty years there has been strong pressure from local officials to resettle some or all of the lake dwellers and to rearrange the patterns of houseboats and doonga boots. This pressure is based on a deeply-held belief that a major cause of problems that afflict the lake is the fact that people live on it.

Due to this “deeply-held belief,” the government developed resettlement plans for the lake dwellers and also plans for relocating houseboats. For the

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market gardeners and others who had encroached into the lake, the government assumed the following situation: The lake . . . provides shelter to about 50 hamlets with a population of over 50000 people who have property rights over 300 hectares of agricultural land and 670 hectares of water. . . . The encroachment instigated by popular greed had deteriorated the condition of the lake. . . . This may need immediate dislodgement of the families to save the natural heritage. (GK 19.11.2012)

Hence, the plan was to remove many of the Dal dweller families and resettle them away from the Dal (Ghani 2014: 61–64). To reach that goal, the government offered financial compensation of, as I was told, 4 lakh rupees per kanal for agricultural land, Rs 3.60 lakh per kanal for lotus gardens, Rs 1.8 lakh per kanal for watery land without lotus, and only Rs 1.4 lakh per kanal for land covered with reeds. At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the government started to put these resettlement plans into action. But many inhabitants of the lake were very skeptical about the government’s plan, and it was mainly poorer families that accepted the offer. In May 2002, the KT (01.04.2002) criticized, “Government has long made claims of acquiring houses in the lake area. . . . But inaction during the past few years has only belied the hopes of people.” For the wealthier families who often had lived on their plot for generations, resettlement was less appealing. Next to a strong emotional attachment to their “place,” they usually enjoyed a good income, and, not least, their future after a resettlement was thought to be uncertain. For all these reasons, it was very difficult for the government to convince the market gardeners to leave their place and settle away from the Dal. The project slowly gathered speed when finally, in 2005, Rakh-i-Arath, a plot some fourteen kilometers away from Srinagar, was chosen for resettlement, and houses and a modern infrastructure were promised to those willing to leave the Dal. But, as the following paragraph will show, the implementation of the project had many problems, and it is still difficult for the government to convince the lake dwellers to abandon their places. Moreover, even if the resettlement project were to succeed, it would not solve the problems of the lake’s ecology. Already at the end of the twentieth century, Baptie Shaw and Morton (BSM 1986), an agency commissioned to look into the matter and who had examined the possibilities for a resettlement of lake dwellers in some detail, was very critical of the idea that dislodging the Dal dwellers would have a positive effect on the lake’s ecology. Principally, they concluded that resettlement would not solve the main problems of sewage pollution from Srinagar and rampant lakeshore encroachment. Some years later, APC/ODA (1989: 143) farsightedly provided ample food for thought when they mentioned the important role that

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market gardeners play in coping with the nutritional situation of Srinagar (described in detail in chapter 6): Relocation of lake dwellers is intended [to,] . . . and undoubtedly will, reduce the availability of vegetables in Srinagar since about 50 percent of these are currently produced on the land and floating gardens of the lake. The view expressed by some officials in the city that other agricultural land will become available to make up the deficit is unrealistic. In the first place, land on the lake has been built up over many years, by the addition of various composting materials, to attain its present highly productive capacity. Other land in the area is not as developed nor productive and is mainly used to grow rice or fruit trees. Second, it must be noted that agricultural land availability is declining rapidly, as developers convert such land to residential and commercial uses. This is reflected in the declining proportion of labor force engaged in agriculture. We therefore view the resettlement proposals with considerable concern, and believe that they could well have a very harmful impact on the nutritional variety available to the city residents.

This problem became obvious in June and July 2016 when Srinagar remained under siege and was subject to civil unrest and a more or less complete strike. At that time, only ten to twelve truckloads of vegetables and fruit came in from outside; but in this situation, the market gardeners of the Dal were able to make up for the more than 50 percent reduction in outside imports. And not only that, “amidst the ongoing unrest, while the growers have ensured abundant supply of locally cultivated vegetables, the vendors ensure the price remain under check . . . the decline in the supply of vegetables from other states around this time is being met locally” (GK 05.08.2016). In these severe times, the important role of the market gardeners in supplying vegetables to the city became evident. Every day, they sold their vegetables on the famous Floating Vegetable Market: The trading of these locally grown vegetables begins with wholesalers—who then pass it to vendors for consumption in restriction bound Srinagar and its peripheries. . . . They [the vegetable growers] say that in the ongoing unrest in Kashmir, the Dal Lake’s floating vegetable market . . . functional for over 100 years now—has become one of the most important sources of vegetables, since curfew has not been imposed on the lake and the market functions every morning uninhibitedly. (GK 20.09.2016)

But next to this mandatory buffer function of the market gardeners in times of crisis and also in peaceful times, the supply of their fresh vegetables to the people of Srinagar was and is of an outstanding importance—not least because it drastically reduces the need to import vegetables from outside the valley. However, these sustenance aspects are only one of the reasons why plans to resettle the market gardeners away from the lake must be challenged. It has also been shown that the government cannot guarantee that the families

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concerned will be better off after resettlement. This became evident when APC/ODA members visited the first resettlements for Dal dwellers. They described the various problems and provided the following warning: In summary, we believe that involuntary resettlement of lake dwellers would harm Srinagar’s agriculture and tourism, leave the relocated population far worse off than they are now, and achieve few, if any, tangible benefits. Furthermore our visit to the [first] resettlement colony which has been operational for five years showed that it still has no piped water and that it gives an appearance of considerable desolation when compared with the complex and active lifestyle of villages in the lake. (APC/ODA 1989: 144)

In the light of what followed in the next years, it is important to highlight that, already in 1989, APC/ODA (p. 146) stated expressively that no part of our proposed program [to curb pollution] requires resettlement of any of the population from the waterways. We therefore recommend that this should be stated clearly and unambiguously and that the ODA [Overseas Development Administration of APC 1989] should take steps to ensure that the British Government is not associated in any way with this element of the overall strategy proposed by the J & K Government [italics added].

Indeed, most of the Dal dwellers who were relocated some three miles away from the lake, in the outskirts of Srinagar, in 2002 complained about the new situation: “We were living in impoverished conditions within the lake” says G. H. Tand, a carpet weaver by trade. “We were told we’d have better conditions if we moved out. But we’re worse off.” And another resident of the new colony said that: “. . . Here is a lack of amenities here . . . and most important there are also no jobs.” When his family lived on the Dal lake, [his] wife and children collected grass and sold it as fodder for cattle, captained a shikara, and wove mats. “We were experts in mat weaving, but we can’t do this here . . . there were many avenues for earning a living on the lake, but here there are none.” In this context also A. R. Yousuf, a professor of environmental studies at Kashmir University in Srinagar [criticized] that it may be possible for the remaining population to live in harmony with the lake, as people have done for centuries. (AlterNet 08.07.2005)11

And it was also reported that “the relocation colonies have proven to be such a poor option for many Dal dwellers that some sold their plots after arriving in the colony and returned to the lake.”

Compensation and Resettlement of Dal Dwellers at Rakh-i-Arath Notwithstanding all these critics and warnings from BSM (1986), APC/ ODA (1989), and others, the J & K High Court, together with the J & K

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government, set up in 2003 the “Road Map for Restoring the Glory of the Famous Lake” and for the resettlement of the Dal dwellers on a large scale, especially those who had illegally encroached into the lake.12 In the next few years, not much was done. The recommendation was that the lake dwellers should be resettled close to the lake so that they could earn their livelihood. In the years that followed up to 2007, due to the ongoing militancy in the valley, there was no progress in the resettlement plans. But then the plans to relocate Dal dwellers were pursued again because, with militant violence at its lowest ever since the revolt started in 1989, authorities say that they can finally focus on saving Dal Lake with a multi-million dollar clean up that could see the mass removal of some 60,000 people living off its water. . . . The lake authorities say it will spend $74 million cleaning up the lake with new sewage treatment plants and drain clearage. More controversially, it plans to spend nearly $80 million of federal funds to relocate 58 settlements around the lake to a 1,000 acre site a few miles inland. The first 300 families could be moved by the end of the year. . . . Many lake dwellers, some of whom have been there for decades, distrust the relocation plan proposal— despite the offer of up to $10,000 compensation for their homes. “They cannot do this, this is our bread and butter” said Mohammad Sultan. . . . “If they give us money for the land, how long would it last?” (A. Scrutton in Reuters UK 30.03.2007)

Finally in 2009, the government decided that Rakh-i-Arath, near the Bemina flood channel, some fourteen kilometers west of Srinagar, would be a suitable place that, “once developed, will be a satellite township of Srinagar having all ultra-modern facilities” (GK 23.07.2009). It was communicated that “the state government has developed 6,000 plots in Rakh-i-Arath housing colony for the rehabilitation of families who were displaced from the Dal lake [and that] in phase I, 6,000 plots would be developed and by September this year 500 families would be shifted to the colony” (GK 23.07.2009). In 2010, the Indian Express reported that, after a high-level meeting of officers, an official spokesman said that “as many as 634 structures have so far been acquired and later demolished under Dal Lake Development Programme,” and that “the owners of these demolished structures have been settled in eight colonies.” Also, the spokesman said that Rakh-i-Arath had been developed for the rehabilitation of the remaining Dal dwellers “on modern lines[,] and all the basic amenities would be made available for the convenience of the people, who are being shifted from Dal Lake” (Indian Express 28.12.2010). In 2012, 7,526 kanals of land were transferred to LAWDA for the resettlement of about 10,000 lake dwellers. It was said that in order to rehabilitate the Dal dwellers, 7,526 kanals of land at Rakh-i-Arath would be taken up in three phases for rehabilitation. During the first and the second phase, as

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many as 3,000 kanals of land each and 1,526 kanals of land during the third phase would be taken up for developing modern facilities for those to be rehabilitated. A glorious future, a splendid and comfortable way of living, was propagated for those who would leave the Dal and settle in Rakh-i-Arath (image 10.3); and it was especially noted that the necessary facilities such as healthcare, education, and electricity would be provided to them: Rakh-i-Arath will be developed as a township having better road connectivity besides proper sewage and drainage systems in addition to modern health care, education and shopping facilities. An amount of Rs 57 crore have been utilized for the acquisition of land and the rehabilitation of two hundred families besides different developmental activities at Rakh-i-Arath. (KO 07.12.2012)

There were also plans to compensate the displaced families (KT 21.12.2012). In May 2013, the government transferred 7,526 kanals of land in Rakh-i-Arath in order to expedite and implement the Rakh-i-Arath project. In a meeting of high-level authorities, N. R. Jora, the minister for urban development and local bodies, directed Revenue department and LAWDA to work in close coordination to settle the issue hindering early settlement of Dal dwellers. The meeting was informed that as many as 500 plots have been developed and allotted to Dal dwellers so far, while as presently 55 structures are under construction in Rakh-i-Arath colony. (KT 12.05.2013)

Image 10.3. A signboard leading to the Rakh-i-Arath colony (August 2015). Photo by the author.

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But very little progress was observed in the project, and in June 2013, it was again criticized: plans for shifting some chunks of population close to the water bodies and responsible for causing pollution are neither executed nor acted upon despite funding available for this purpose. . . . The rehabilitation and relocation of the families from Dal Lake is long overdue because of the careless attitude of the authorities. It is time for the government to act fast and formulate the policy at least for the future. (KT 18.06.2013)

Again LAWDA, in a meeting with Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, grandiosely gave a résumé of the present status of land development at Rakh-iArat, stating, [The] project involves development costs of over Rs 416 crore [and that] out of 7,526 kanals of land made available for housing colony for Dal dwellers, 4,000 kanals would be under plots, 1,082 kanals under road, 175 kanals under commercial offices, 50 kanals under institutions, 438 kanals under nodal facilities, 150 kanals under education and health facilities, 189 kanals under play fields, parks and incidental space, 50 kanals for religious purposes, 340 kanals for graveyards, 52 kanals for sewage treatment and 1,000 as wetlands. (KO 12. 07, 2013)

Some months later, it was reported that Chief Minister Omar Abdullah had directed to shrink the timeframe for the rehabilitation and resettlement project for the Dal dwellers from five years to three. He had asked LAWDA to fast-track the compensation of affected families and provide them plots at identified sites. S. Nehru (secretary of housing and urban development) had visited the site, and said that LAWDA is aimed to provide land to nearly 10,000 families. . . . Further on ViceChairperson of LAWDA, Irfan Yasin reported that: “200 cases for rehabilitation have been processed on fast track in past two month” and that “plots have been allotted for up to 4,000 dwellers and nearly 70 of them have already constructed houses in Rakh-i-Arath . . .” (GK 27.10.2013)

Due to the government declaration that they would be compensated for their property on the Dal and that Rakh-i-Arath would be a suitable place with modern infrastructural facilities, more and more Dal dwellers took an interest in the project. They now asked for their rehabilitation and decried the delay in the rehabilitation plan: Hundreds of Dal dwellers waiting for their rehabilitation. . . . [The] Assistant Commissioner Revenue [ACR] Srinagar is causing undue delay in the execution of work . . .” Our documents have been checked and rechecked by all the concerned departments. . . . The officer . . . is demanding . . . hefty sums from the poor people.” . . . Even after submitting all the legal documents, the said officer is not executing the work. (KO 06.11.2013)

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In August 2013, the governor N. N. Vohra reviewed the implementation of the various components of the “Dal-Nageen Conservation and Management Project.” After the vice chairman, Irfan Yasin [LAWDA], gave his presentation of the situation, the “governor stressed the importance of each component of the Project being simultaneously implemented within the envisaged time frames if the Dal Lake was to be saved.” Under the heading “Half-Hearted Approach on Dal,” it stated that “no amount of money can help in relocation of dwellers from the water body”: The recent announcement of the central government to provide more than Rs 300 crore for rehabilitation of Dal dwellers has again restarted the debate about the intentions of the state government. The previous attempts to relocate the dwellers have been found to have been unimaginative and short-sighted. . . . None of the plans which have been restricted to the drawing boards could take off due to stiff opposition from the Dal dwellers. (KT 09.11.2013)

In 2014, not much progress was seen, and it was only in a November meeting that the issue of slow progress on the development of the Rakh-iArath Housing Colony for Dal dwellers came up again: VC LAWDA informed the meeting that out of the Rs 416 crore earmarked on the rehabilitation of Dal dwellers and the State sector, only Rs 9.25 crore have been released so far that has severely hampered the progress of development of Rakh-i-Arath Colony. (KT 16.06.2014)

In August 2015, when I visited Rakh-i-Arath twenty-six years after APC/ ODA had published their critical analysis, very little had been achieved. Many of the houses were only half ready, and many families still had to live in shacks (image 10.4). I was told that there was still no piped water and that they even had to install the wires for their electricity supply by themselves. The biggest problem for the inhabitants, however, was that there were no jobs available in their area or in the next small town several miles away. I was also informed that in many places water comes to the surface after heavy rains, creating muddy spaces with large puddles. This situation was surely known beforehand, because the term rakh means “uncultivated land adjacent to a moist area or a wetland.” To overcome this problem, “thousands of trucks, tippers had been pressed into work by various contractors for filling up the marshy land to set foundations for the Rakh-i-Arth colony under the execution of LAWDA.” Here, typical for the often disharmonic relationship between governmental institutions, royalty fees that had to be paid to the Geology and Mining Department on account of soil excavation in Budgam were “yet to be paid . . . despite several reminders . . . officially sent to the procuring agency.” These royalties, pending for many years, represent a loss of crores of rupees for the state (GK 09.11.2017).

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Image 10.4. Some of the half-ready houses built for rehabilitated Dal dwellers at Rakh-i-Arath (August 2015). Photo by the author.

In January 2016, the overall situation had not changed, and the Dal dwellers boycotted a meeting called by the authorities. They requested that the governor of the state allot land in Chandipora for their rehabilitation, because, as they argued, “Rakh-i-Arath is not a suitable place for people” (KO 30.01.2016). In February of the same year, the court directed LAWDA to explain the delay in completion of Rakh-i-Arath development project, saying, “Previously LAWDA would project scarcity of funds as a reason for its inability to go ahead with the project. Now that enough funds have been released and proposal to make part of funds available . . . it remains to be known as to what stands in way of LAWDA to speed up on the project,” the court said and directed them to file status report, explaining delay by first week of February. (KT 03.02. 2016)

At the end of 2016, not only were the traditional places of the market gardeners and of other island dwellers still contested, but the only half-developed new places at Rakh-i-Arath were barely accepted. Some months earlier in May 2016, after so many high-level meetings had been convened to discuss the resettlement problem and advance proposals to speed up the process, the minister for urban development and local bodies, N. R. Jora, again called for a meeting in order to expedite the process: “[He] emphasized on the officers dealing with the project for early settlement of Dal dwellers [and]

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directed Revenue department and LAWDA work in close coordination to settle the issues hindering early settlement of Dal dwellers” (KT 12.05.2016). In February 2017, the authorities announced a plan to resettle the farmers from the Mir Behri settlements on the Dal. This triggered major protests from the dwellers of the Mir Behri area of Dal Lake under the banner of the Farmers Welfare Organization: “. . . What will we do if government acquires our agricultural land. . . . The land is our main source of our living. We grow vegetables and sell these in market. If this land is taken away from us, we will die of starvation,” they said and appealed to government to reconsider the decision. “It is the responsibility of the government to provide government job to a member of the each relocated family,” they said. (GK 21.02.2017; see also KO 21.02.2017)

Here it is important to know that the Mir Behri region along the Dole Demb part of the Dal (see map 5.1 and figure 9.9d) was the planned relocation site for the majority of tourist houseboats, and that the plan was to use the acreage of the market gardeners to construct a road and other facilities for the tourists to reach the boats. Between August 2010 and April 2017, as figure 10.2 shows, a total of 261 plots were allotted for Dal dweller households in Rakh-i-Arath. Here, one plot comprises seven marlas (1 marla = 25 m2). In a meeting on 4 January 2014, it was decided that a person holding a ration card with six household members would be allotted one plot (176.5 m2); above six members, two plots; above twelve members, three plots; and above eighteen members, four plots. As figure 10.2 shows, over the years a certain decrease in plots assigned

Figure 10.2. Number of plots allotted per month to Dal dwellers in Rakh-i-Arath between August 2010 and April 2017. Graph by the author based on data courtesy of J & K Lakes and Waterways Development Authorities, LAWDA, Srinagar.

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to households in Rakh-i-Arath can be observed. The reason might be that there is a certain reluctance to move to Rakh-i-Arath due to the lack of the facilities promised by the government and/or to the shortage of job opportunities in the region. It is also possible that for financial reasons, the construction of new houses had declined, and thus the program to resettle Dal dwellers at Rakh-i-Arath had slowed down. However, it was reported in May 2017 that the nongovernmental organization Kashmir Welfare Trust (under the presidency of M. A. Wangnoo), in collaboration with LAWDA, had begun to construct around one hundred houses there along with some infrastructure for the downtrodden Dal dwellers who had lived on the Dal under miserable conditions since the devastating flood in September 2014 (GK 15.05.2017). The outcome of this enterprise will only be seen in the years to come.

Resettlement and the Production of Vegetables The importance of vegetable production has already been described in detail in chapter 6, and must be emphasized here again in light of the resettlement program. As APC/ODA (1989: 144) already warned, “We believe that involuntary resettlement of lake dwellers would harm Srinagar’s agriculture” by endangering the provision of fresh vegetables from the lake that is of utmost important for the economy and health of Srinagar’s population. As mentioned before (see chapter 6), only about 47 percent of the lake dwellers own and cultivate the land. Hence, if a rehabilitation and resettlement of Dal dwellers is to be enforced to curb pollution, priority should be given to all those families that do not cultivate vegetables and, of course, to those who lost their land and especially their houses due to the flooding in 2014. This would reduce the pollution stemming from Dal households that do not cultivate vegetables, and it would maintain or possibly even extend a sufficient provision of vegetables for Srinagar. It could also curtail or minimize the import of vegetables from other areas (e.g., from Jammu) and other Indian states. These problems, which have been well known since 1989, were now given special prominence again in the recent recommendations published in the Draft Master Plan: Srinagar Metropolitan Region—2035 (DMPS 2017: 105): The blanket policy of relocation of the Dal dwellers adopted in the aftermath of the approval of the DPR for Conservation and Management of Dal Lake under National Lake Conservation Plan prepared by IIT Roorkee is recommended to be re-examined by the scientific advisory committee appointed by the J & K Government to examine the need for protection of the floating gardens while ensuring protection of the Dal Lake in a sustainable manner. The proliferation of the families of Dal dwellers within lake may not be sustainable,13 however a strategy for protection of an optimum number/area of floating gardens while being used for vegetable planting that additionally provides food security for

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the city (providing fresh vegetables more specifically during the time of emergency) should become part of the sustainable conservation framework for the lake. Detailed mapping of this area including extents of the floating gardens, use, household surveys of the communities inhabiting the floating gardens is recommended to be undertaken. An in-depth understanding of the socio economic-eco system of the area (the floating gardens and houseboats) is also recommended to inform the comprehensive cultural-natural tourism development plan for the Dal Lake area.

And regarding the exceptional importance of Dal Lake, the same source states: The vegetable produce from the gardens provides the much needed fresh food supply to the people of Srinagar. These further are an area of immense interest to visitors and tourists thus further enhancing the livelihood opportunities for local communities. The mode of transport and housing along the floating gardens provides a unique character for promotion of cultural tourism in the region. . . . Floating gardens are an example of extraordinary knowledge system of local communities used for the preservation of the lake. (DMPS 2017: 104; see also 36–37, 96)

Contesting the Houseboat Owner’s Place The boat is a floating piece of space, a place without a place that exists by itself, that is closed in on itself and at the same time is given over to the infinity of the sea. —Foucault 1984: 9

As mentioned before, the places where the houseboats are moored, often for generations, are also contested. They are considered to be one of the main polluters of the lake, and already at the end of the twentieth century plans were developed to remove them from their traditional places. It was thought that in new places they could be properly realigned and connected to a sewage system so that they would no longer pollute the lake. Compared to the situation of the market gardeners, for houseboat owners to move from their traditional place to a new one would not be as dramatic an undertaking because, unlike the market gardeners, they could take their capital (their boat) with them. For the houseboat owners, their “place” is mainly their boat, sometimes together with a small plot of land next to which the boat is moored. But the water surrounding the boat can be understood as “their space,” because its quality is of special importance for their business. Here, two aspects have to be taken into account depending on the tourists’ differential aspirations. A minority, mainly foreign tourists and, in general, all those who prefer a quiet place and/or are interested in the beauty of

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the scenery or the flora and fauna of the lake, choose “places” farther away from the masses of houseboats moored next to each other opposite Boulevard Road. The majority however, not least most tourists from India, prefer “places” from which a shikara will take them quickly to Boulevard Road with its many shops and restaurants. Unlike situations in which an aesthetic value of a place is important, in others the economic value predominates. As the following on the plans for realigning houseboats at new places will show, these aspects are of great importance. It cannot be denied that, especially in the main tourist season from April to September, sewage from the houseboats contributes to the degradation of the Dal. Nonetheless, even before the number of houseboats had grown from about 215 in the 1950s to more than 700 in recent times, it was claimed that the owners of houseboats were the main polluters of the Dal next to the market gardeners and other island dwellers. Therefore, government institutions tried to decree that owners of houseboats should install sanitary tanks in their boats. In May 2011 it was declared that not only hotels, even houseboats would have to take extra precautionary measures to avoid losing their registration. Lakes and Waterways Development Agency (LAWDA) though is yet to start a fully functional houseboat sanitation program is currently experimenting with the temporary sanitation systems provided to few houseboats. LAWDA Vice Chairman Irfan Yaseen told Kashmir Times that a service motor boat that has been involved in this houseboat sanitation program would carry daily litter and sewage to treatment plants. (KT 20.05.2011)

But whatever the outcome of the experiments has been, after yearlong discussions and negotiations in which houseboat owners tried to prompt the government to help them financially if they were compelled to install sanitation systems, nothing happened. Finally, because both sides refused to spend money on installing such systems, only very few of the 750 boats on the lake in 2017 were equipped with a sanitary tank system in which sewage could be collected and then dumped away from the lake. Thus, most sewage and other waste from houseboats is still disposed into the water body where it contributes to the lake’s eutrophication. Then an attempt was made to solve the problem by reducing the number of boats, and a law was passed strictly forbidding the construction of new houseboats and the repair of heavily damaged ones. But in November 2012, Rs 3.40 crore were utilized to construct two dockyards on Dal and Nageen Lakes for the repair and renovation of houseboats (KO 03.02.2012). Moreover, despite the government’s refusal to financially help owners repair many boats demolished in a heavy storm in September 2013, the Draft Master Plan: Srinagar Metropolitan Region—2035 (DMPS 2017: 71) still advised that the “dockyard for houseboat repair has to be upgraded.”

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Realigning Houseboats For many decades, all houseboats for tourists have been moored at different places on Dal and Nageen Lakes, but the majority was, and still is, concentrated in the Gagribal basin, Dal Lock area, and close to Nehru Park opposite Boulevard Road (see image 7.4). It is especially there that these boats contribute heavily to the pollution of the region in the six months of the tourist season. Already in 1987, the Government of India Urban Development Department published the Greater Srinagar and Dal Environmental Project (Proposal) (GSDE 1987), which emphasized the need to connect the houseboats to a sewage system (in paragraphs 2.1, 2.4, 3.13, and 3.2a). Later, DPR (2000: vol. 2, part 1, p. 557a) developed a plan to curb the problem by “realigning the houseboats in groups such that the sewage is collected at the rear end and brought to a common point where a slump is provided.” In 2005, LAWDA then developed and published a plan (figure 10.3) for this realignment of houseboats in the Gagribal basin, at Dal Lock Gate, and next to Nehru Park.

Figure 10.3. The 2005 Houseboat Owners Association layout for relocating and realigning houseboats. Source: Courtesy HBOA.

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In principle, such a plan was supported by the Houseboat Owners Association (HBOA), but their chairman Yaqoob Dunoo wrote in the Kashmir Observer that “the realignment of houseboats in Dal Lake should be made according to the layout issued by ‘LAWDA’ in the year 2005” (KO 16.7.2011). Here certain modifications had been proposed by the HBOA that were outlined together with a new layout for realigning the boats (figure 10.4). In the following months, this and other proposals were discussed until finally, when the different representatives of governmental institutions and representatives from the HBOA under the chairmanship of the chief secretary came together in a meeting in October 2011, a new plan was proposed: the houseboats should be shifted to the Dole Demb (see map 5.1) region

Figure 10.4. Detail of the Houseboat Owner Association’s new layout for realigning houseboats. Source: Courtesy HBOA.

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in the central west of the lake (GK 20.10.2011). Immediately, in a notification published in Rising Kashmir (21.10.2011), M. A. Tuman, at the time chairman of the HBOA, announced that “Houseboat Owners Decline Prospected Shifting of Houseboats.” Here also different reasons were given for the rejection. It was considered, for instance, that the frequent storms that create high water levels especially in the Dole Demb area would endanger the boats. Another problem they considered was the inability of tourists to reach Boulevard Road from the new faraway place and the loss that would incur for the houseboat owners. About a year later on 30 October 2012, the Jammu and Kashmir High Court then decreed a realignment of more than 320 houseboats (KO 31.10.2012). One week later, the general secretary of the Houseboat Owners Association (HBOA), H. Wangoo, who had welcomed the recent court judgment on the preservation of the lake, demanded, We are ready to move the houseboats. But Lakes and Waterways Development Authority (LAWDA) needs to sort out this issue first for the smooth execution of the plan. . . . LAWDA has promised that they will provide us hygienic kitchens and servant quarters [and] that some 320 houseboats will have to shift from their present position which will facilitate easy drainage of the waste coming out from these boats. (KO 07.11.2012)

But for the next three years, nothing happened until: Following up on the Cabinet decision that sanctioned Rs 29.50 crore for realignment of houseboats in the Dal lake, the chief minister was informed by VC LAWDA that 380 houseboats will be shifted and aligned at Dole Demb with 76 adjusted in each of the five bays by undertaking land and shoreline development as well as providing sewer connectivity. (KT 25.11.2015)

When two years later in 2017 the new Draft Master Plan: Srinagar Metropolitan Region—2035 was published, the following was again urged: “Alignment of houseboats to houseboat zone that is fully equipped with trunk infrastructure. The implementation of the alignment of houseboats along the Dole Demb has been tardy with insignificant progress” (DMPS 2017: 69). Finally, in the summer of 2017, after some market gardeners of the Dole Demb area had been resettled in Rakh-i-Arath, construction work started. A year later, activities to clean up the lake for the future mooring of some three hundred houseboats could be seen along the shore of the whole Dole Demb stretch (see arrow in figure 9.9d). Now, the construction of a road was also in progress that would later connect up with a broader and fortified causeway so that motor vehicles could transport tourists relatively quickly from their houseboats to Boulevard Road to shop and visit restaurants. It can be hoped that now, after many decades of discussion, about three hundred houseboats can be moored at the new place and connected to a properly working sewage system.

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The “Making of Places” and the Demolition of Illegal Constructions The corporate sector is extraordinarily influential. They get away with almost anything. Corruption is a big issue. . . . Some people benefit, of course. The gains are there for some people. But the pains of growth have to be borne by the majority. —Jairam Ramesh, Indian Minister of the Environment and Conservation [2009–2011] regarding India’s ecological situation, The Guardian 02.07.2015 The Prophet said: Whoever takes any part of land without having a right to it, he shall be, as a punishment for it, sunk down into earth on the day of resurrection to the depth of seven earths. —Bukhāri 46. 13, Maulana Muhammad Ali 1844/1990

Unlike the encroachments by people living on the lake who are trying to enlarge the size of their agricultural land, a second type of encroachment is initiated by city people who “create places”—or in Low’s (2017) terminology, who “socially produce space”—within the contested two-hundredmeter zone sometimes close to the lake’s shore or even in the shallow waters of the Dal. Already in the 1980s, Zutshi (1987: 575) wrote, based on a twoyear monitoring program, There is no control on the process of encroachment. Big business has completely taken the control of the surrounding area of the Dal lake with small residential houses being converted either into hotels or commercial establishments as a result of which the effluent load to the lake water increases.

Today, despite the ban on construction within two hundred meters of the lake, trucks clandestinely approach places in this zone at night where they drop loads of sand, gravel, and other filling and building materials to create land for the construction of houses, workshops, small hotels, or restaurants. In 2002, the High Court of J & K issued directives to clean up the Dal and to counter illegal encroachments. Because no serious effort was made to combat the encroachments, the Jammu and Kashmir government stepped in (KT 27.07.2003) and mandated the following actions: 1. Thirteen hotels situated in and around the Dal Lake are to be shifted to alternative places. 2. All kinds of constructions that exist as of today within the limits of two hundred meters or more should be removed. 3. All construction within two hundred meters of lakes, starting from the center of road, should be banned. 4. Trees should be auctioned and the encroachments should be removed. 5. The filling of the lake with soil to convert it into land should be forbidden; the fillings should be removed and the area reclaimed.

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In the following years, no real progress could be registered; and in 2012, a division bench of the High Court directed the state government to take special measures “to give a new lease of life to the lake,” stating, The encroachments instigated by popular greed had deteriorated the condition of the lakes. There is a need for strict provision for the families which have encroached upon the lake. This may need immediate dislodgement of the families to save the natural heritage. (GK 19.11.2012)

For the renaturalization of land, the institutions concerned had to differentiate between those encroachments constructed centuries or many decades earlier by market gardeners and those created within the twohundred-meter zone by Srinagar citizens. The first case concerns all the land with settlements and gardens that came into being over time after the causeway was constructed around the year 1450 (see maps 4.1–4.3; figures 6.4 and 6.5), and also for the encroachments stretching west of the Hazratbal road into the Nageen and east of the road into the Dal that are about sixty or more years old and were carried out at a time when no pertinent laws had been implemented. Therefore, renaturalization of land was and is possible only when it is clear that the plots are an encroachment, and that buildings have been erected especially in the two-hundred-meter zone after the law had been passed. However, whether the law is applied and enforced depends effectively on the power relations between the owners of the places and the contesting governmental institutions. In cases where the newly encroached land of market gardeners should be renaturalized and/or some small buildings demolished, there is not much the inhabitants of the plot can do to avoid the loss of their property. Few of them have enough money to bribe those who are vested with the authority to stop the implementation of the law. The situation is far different in those cases where “greedy” townspeople encroach on land to build hotels, restaurants, or shopping malls close to the Dal’s shore. Here, power relations are more equalized, because it is often rich and influential families that are behind the construction. As Kaul and Bobb pointed out already in 1982, In Kashmir, however, politics and business are on the same side of the coin and the new hoteliers are part of the same club whose members are scion of the state’s dominant business families. It can be said that there are only three important families and the so called “group of the seven” (a consortium of seven leading business families who also happen to be the staunchest supporters of Chief Minister Sheikh Abdullah) who are the main builders of the new hotel imperium. (p. 66)

In the 1980s, as Bano (1986: 39) reported, only on the “one-kilometer stretch known as Boulevard Road no less than 20 hotels currently living cheek by jowl and even more are under various stages of construction and

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already 90 hotels bordered at the whole of the eastern bank of the lake.” But notwithstanding the official declarations and warnings that illegal encroachments and buildings constructed closer than two hundred meters from the shore or in the lake would be destroyed, the law was rarely enforced—not least because, as Bano already wrote in 1986, “so far as the removal of encroachment is concerned the Government is reluctant to take any bold action as the people involved belong to powerful lobbies and are in a position to frustrate any Governmental action directed against them” (p. 42). “Place-making” in the form and process of encroachment and the contesting of such places by the government always was, and still is, a cat-andmouse game between those who take possession of space in order to create a place for themselves and the institutions that, according to the law, should prevent such activities. I observed a typical example of such a cat-and-mouse game one day in 2013 when a rich businessman started to erect a small hotel-cum-restaurant on a small island. The builder told me that the island had been in the possession of his family for generations and that he has at his command a document ( ferman*) to prove it. Nonetheless, when the building was more or less completed, the enforcement squad of LAWDA came and took the structure down. Some weeks later, construction work started again and the half-ready building was demolished for a second time. But when the building was re-erected for the third time, it was not touched, and the owner started his tourist business. As to be expected, the people on the lake were quick to exchange their ideas about who gave money when and to whom. Already in 2008, in an interview with GK, a businessman remarked, If the government does not wake up from the deep slumber, the day is not far away when the lake will be totally encroached. . . . There is no fun watching the deterioration of the lake for political and financial interests of some politicians and officials. (GK 07.03.2008)

As Gupta and Ferguson (1997: 17) emphasized “not only that processes of place making are always contested and unstable but also that relations between places are continuously shifting as a result of the political and economic reorganization of space.” Therefore, not much has been undertaken in recent years, especially because of the unstable political and economic situation. Regarding the situation in Srinagar after the big flood in September 2014, the Centre of Science and Environment (CSE) in India pointed out that “more than 50 percent of the lakes, ponds and wetlands of Srinagar have been encroached upon for constructing buildings and roads in the past 100 years” (Times of India 10.09.2014). In the recent past, many of the newly created places on encroached land have been established in the years of unrest and turmoil in the late 1980s and

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1990s when no official surveillance was possible. But it was not only in times of militancy that the authorities concerned were unable to control and fight encroachments. Also, in recent years it has often been observed that whenever the government was occupied with major problems,14 people used the situation to their advantage. For example, in 2008, there are apprehensions expressed by the citizens of Kashmir that the “coming elections” may encourage some sections of people in and around the Dal to make encroachments in the Dal lake. Since the Government shall be preoccupied with election process it may like to avoid confronting mindless encroachers during the election campaign. . . . (GK 31.03.2008)

Also, in February 2013, some people took advantage of the chaotic protests and demonstrations in Srinagar (following the hanging of Afzal Guru in Delhi who was convicted for his role in the 2001 Indian Parliament attack) and started to construct illegal structures in Dal interiors and the catchment area. This time, however, several were caught red-handed, and LAWDA’s enforcement squad quickly demolished twenty of the illegal constructions in various areas along the northern and western Foreshore Road and at Shalimar (GK and KO 21.02.2013). The most morally reprehensible events occurred between October and December 2014. Some unscrupulous people took advantage of the situation when many died and several hundred families lost their homes in the big flood. While all agencies were occupied with helping the flood victims, these people secretly started (probably under political clout) constructions near the Dal. For one case in November 2014, GK reported that LAWDA destroyed two buildings, “despite the pressure from several political circles”: “These persons took undue advantage of the situation arising due to the flood and undertook constructions in green belt area of the lake along Nishat. Our enforcement squad demolished two huge under construction buildings meant for commercial purpose at Nishat locality” said Secretary of Lakes and Waterways Development Authority (LAWDA) Syed Shabir. (GK 01.10.2014, see also GK 03.12.2014)

However, all such, in fact, quite rare undertakings by the responsible institutions seem to be a drop in the bucket when we read that the minister of law, justice and parliamentary affairs informed parliament in 2014 that as many as 1,370 fresh constructions had been started without permission within 200 meters of the fringes of Dal Lake between October 2013 and December 2014 (GK 23.02.2014) and that, during evenings, some unscrupulous LAWDA officials and police allow trucks to dump construction material on roadsides in areas close to the lake. It was further stated that “enforcement squads of Srinagar Municipal Corporation, Srinagar Development Authority and LAWDA have been grabbing millions as kickbacks for

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allowing the violations, and that portions of it was being distributed among their higher-ups in Civil Secretariat.” And again, no rigorous measures were undertaken to cope with the problem, so that a comprising report published in January 2015 stated, In absence of any regulation by the Lakes and Waterways Development Authority (LAWDA) entrusted with Dal conservation, illegal constructions are going on even inside the dying waterbody. Sources said due to unhindered movement of construction material, many illegal structures are coming up in various areas. . . .” (GK 07.01.2015)15

It seems as if there is no political power or genuine will to destroy this nexus between LAWDA officials and unscrupulous people who are undertaking illegal constructions. Because of this, one year later, the High Court reported that a case against LAWDA officials was registered: “Some progress appears to have been made by Vigilance Organization Kashmir in registering cases against LAWDA officials who prima facie appear to have facilitated illegal constructions to come up within Lake and prohibited area” (KT 24.03.2016). Obviously, notwithstanding the numerous J & K High Court directions to hamper encroachments, there is no way to completely obliterate the socalled “land mafia” and consistently demolish the structures erected on the encroached land while punishing the perpetrators and the officers who have collected kickbacks. This was conveyed again when, in the prevailing law and order situation in June and July 2016, the land mafia had free reign to encroach upon Dal Lake in various areas. As so often, again in July 2016 the Jammu and Kashmir High Court has directed all Deputy Commissioners to ensure no construction is raised on water bodies within their territorial jurisdiction. Hearing a Public Interest Litigation (PIL), the bench on June 15, this year, had made it clear that in case of any breach of court order, the authorities concerned will be liable for punishment for committing the contempt of court. (GK 13.07.2016)

However, this directive, as so many High Court orders before, was ineffective. This became clear when, in the times of unrest in June and July 2016 and the valley was under siege and curfew, and around fifty people were killed and more than two thousand injured and another one hundred blinded during the protests, and when people from all walks of life are suffering, there is a group of people who take undue advantage of the crisis. . . . When the present killing spree began some vested interested people started encroaching in the Dal Lake in the interior areas around Jogi Lankar Rainawari. (GK 24.07.2016; see also KR 05.08.2016)

In February 2016, vice chairman of LAWDA Dr. S. Hafeez said, “There’s a definite court directive and we’re working towards the survival of our wa-

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ter bodies. We have demolished some 120 structures in the vicinity of the [Dal] lake from past one year.” However what actually was demolished were mainly the houses of poor Dal dwellers that had been damaged by the flood in 2014 (KO 01.02.2017) and that the government had refused to help reconstruct. Under the heading “Leaving Big Fish, LAWDA Preys upon Poor,” N. Sidiq reported that Saidakadal residents asked, “Why aren’t hotels and commercial units touched?” It becomes more and more obvious that there is a strong “politician– violator nexus facilitating illegal constructions,” as GK had already titled an article on 8 August 2016. “It is inconceivable that even in these dreadful months and weeks, when so many of their fellow citizens are killed and wounded, some of the rich and powerful people use the political turmoil, (and also that) some politicians have been pressurizing the officials not to act against them [the encroachers].” The author of the article also reported that, despite public pressure, hardly any action has been taken against the big fish who have raised commercial complexes on huge scale as these unscrupulous persons have backing of few politicians. They are forcing the enforcement officials on ground not to take any action against blue-eyed persons. . . . However, sources further revealed that the failure of action on part of the enforcement agencies against the violators is seen as “nexus between the corrupt officials and the violators.” (GK 08.08.2016)

Now, as pressure became stronger, LAWDA sought the general public’s cooperation and urged them to come forth with information on any illegal activities taking place in their respective areas. In the following, the enforcement wing of LAWDA swung into action and launched demolition drives in and around the lake, where they demolished illegal constructions near and on the Dal and Nageen (KO 08.08.2016, and GK 10.08.2016, 29.08.2016). Also then, in September 2016, the Jammu and Kashmir High Court finally published the names of some encroachers. (KO 07.09.2016). The “court asked the violators to furnish surety and bail bonds to the satisfaction of its Registrar Judicial, [and] it said [for] others figuring in the list [to] be summoned through bailable warrants in the amount of Rs 50,000” (GK 05.09.2016). This may have been considered a warning signal, but, as expected, there was no end to the encroachments and illegal constructions. Even when some of the structures were also demolished,16 these unscrupulous people were not charged and convicted. Then, in October 2016, after it was observed that all means of curbing and even destroying some new structures in the prohibited zone round the Dal Lake were not enough to stop encroachment, a new method was proposed to solve the problem. In a meeting, Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti with officials from LAWDA, Srinagar Development Au-

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thority, and the Srinagar Municipal Corporation discussed the possibility of installing fifteen closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras near major entry points of the Dal Lake to check the illegal transport of building material (GK 18.19.2016 and KO 19.10.2016). However, these different plans could not hinder further encroachments along the Dal, and when, in April 2017, new buildings were constructed in Brein Nishat near the lake, the KO (13.04.2017) commented: The locals alleged that there is a deep nexus between some LAWDA officials and the unscrupulous elements. . . . “In broad day light, illegal structures have been coming up and still no action is being initiated against the violators.” The locals alleged that “LAWDA officials only target the poor while influentials are spared and given free hand to vandalize picturesque Dal,” said a resident of New Colony Brein.

The strict forbidding of encroachments and construction of any building nearer than two hundred meters from the lake’s shore was enacted to allow renaturaliztion of plots reaching into the water and to enlarge the shrinking surface of the lake. But as far as I have seen, such plots are rarely renaturalized and reintegrated into the lacustrine ecosystem. Many of the rehabilitated places on the lake are still being used for agriculture, and for some, it is said that the government has used them for the construction of official housing projects. In 2015, when a large area on the western shore of the Dal east of the Ashai Bagh Bridge was freed from settlements, people reported that a park and recreation area were being planned there. Already in August 2015, a large platform stretching into the lake had been constructed. It seems that if some areas are rehabilitated, the goal is often not to restore the so-often-mentioned “pristine glory of the lake” by renaturalizing the area but to create recreational centers and parks for the benefit of those who will control and manage them. Coming back to the site in August 2017, work at the platform had stopped, and it seems that the plan to create an amusement park had been scrapped. Such ambitions are not new, as was already reported in 2007: Proposed construction of a massive amusement park on the banks of Dal lake here has raised alarm bells in public circles with environmentalists fearing the construction would play havoc with the natural landscape of the area and trigger a new phase of commercial exploitation of the already over-loaded lake. The fears are accentuated by the state government’s reluctance to say “no” to the concerned business house Gousia Group, despite the fact that the land on which the amusement park is proposed is a green area (restricted zone), the government is said to be taking a “sympathetic” view of the proposal stating that it would like to see what actually the group is coming up with. Even LAWDA is reluctant to stall the project and advised the state government that this is not going to anyway help the Dal conservation efforts. The construction

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and government silence is in contrast to the policy of removing Dal inhabitants from the lake in the name of lessening the pollution load over the water body. While many hundreds of dwellers were removed from the area where they have lived for decades, government is allowing businessmen to exploit the area for economic gains.

Amusement parks are one of the ventures promising high returns and are thus in the minds of those who can afford their construction. So it was no surprise that in 2012, during the endeavor to rehabilitate the lagoon Brari Nambal, the plan for an amusement park came up, as will be described in the following.

The Case of Brari Nambal There is need to create awareness among the stakeholders that preserving the ecology and grandeur of our land is linked with our economic prosperity. —Nayeem Akhter, Minister of Education J & K, KO 24.03.2015

A typical example of the neglect and mismanagement of an important wetland is the case of the Brari Nambal17 lagoon in the western part of Srinagar city. As Shafa’at Rasool reported (GK 14.03.2014), “The Urban Environment Engineering Department (UEED) used the water body as the recipient for its inefficient sewage treatment plant for years. The lagoon, that was once as clear as the Dal, is now a swamp.” This once-spacious lake and the wetlands that in 1971 covered twenty-eight hectares of open water and seventy-two hectares of marsh have been reduced to twenty-one hectares of open water and fifty-six hectares of marsh respectively (Fazal and Amin 2011; 147, box 1). Before the government had filled up Nallah Mar, a waterway that passed through downtown, the lagoon and the nallah provided the main outflow channel for the Dal and were very important for balancing the hydrological situation of the city. They used to release the surplus waters into the river Jhelum via the conduit at Feteh Kadal. The case presents the problems of balancing the implied powers, funding, and the different interests of stakeholders. One would think that absolute priority would go to “restoring the glory of the lagoon,” as reported in most articles when referring to the hydrological importance mentioned above. However, dealing with the problem in a meeting in November 2013, one of the ministers for rural development, A. M. Sagar, “directing the Vice Chairman [of ] LAWDA to speed up the beautification works being carried out at Brari Nambal Lagoon at Baba Demb, said that [the area] can serve as a major tourist attraction in the old city Srinagar” (KO 23.10.2013). Then in August 2015, next to ensuring the proper repair of the lagoon’s sewage treatment plant (STP), Sagar asked the secretary of the Housing and Urban Development Department to

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take immediate measures to de-weed Brari Nambal lagoon. Also, the J & K Bank “proposed to construct a Rose Garden, English Garden, Bogon Velia and Topeyari Garden, French Garden and Lilly Garden. It also proposed a children’s play area, water body with fountains, amphitheater, walking and jogging tracts, boating and adventure zone court” (GK 09.12.2015). As Arif Shafi Wani reported, the minister for roads and buildings, gardens, parks and floriculture, M. A. Bukhari, who had visited the lagoon on 14 June 2015, had directed LAWDA to prepare a comprehensive project for the restoration of the lagoon within a month. Estimated at Rs 70.52 crore, the project included land acquisition, dredging, cleaning, and shoreline development. A senior official of LAWDA said that the “government is yet to accord sanction to the project” and that “LAWDA had several years ago submitted a separate project of Rs. 65 crores for acquiring land and Rs 90 crore for cleaning Brari Nambal.” For the beautification of the water body, or parts of it, the stakeholders of the area were asked to help financially, but this fell on deaf ears; only the J & K Bank offered Rs 20–25 crore over two to three years for the enterprise. So, finally, mainly due to lack of funding, the Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) shelved the plan, and it seems that the noted environmentalist Ajaz Rasool was right when he said, “It is clear that Government is non-serious to restore Brari Nambal. Belying tall claims, Government has failed to even approve conservation projects for the lagoon” (GK 22.11.2015). Finally, at the end of 2015, a delegation led by Gh. R. Dar alleged that, due to official apathy, the lagoon is on the verge of extinction. It was reported that heaps of garbage and an unending stretch of obnoxious weeds, agricultural fields and stinking waters are the only remnants of the lagoon. . . . Vested interest elements have encroached upon major chunks of the lagoon. . . . Scores of hutments, shops and automobile workshops have come up illegally by filling up a large area of the lagoon. (GK 09.12.2015)

The worth and importance of the wetlands is widely known, underlined in many scientific journals and, even more importantly, published in the Kashmir dailies (see chapter 9). In January 2016, at the “World Wetland Day,” S. A. Reshi bemoaned in RK under the heading “Preserving Our Wetlands: Wetlands Are Affected because of Human Greed” that as the world celebrates Wetland Day on February 02. 2016 we are yet to understand what the wetlands are. Are wetlands to be filled with soil and river bed material so to achieve land illegal construction of houses, workshops, godowns [warehouses] and shopping complexes?

Nearly two years after the first discussion about reclaiming the lagoon had started, nothing had happened. On the contrary: in the days and weeks of unrest, illegal constructions went up on the night of 14 August 2016 on Baba Demb road near the cricket stadium opposite Brari Nambal (GK 18.08.2016).

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Half a year later, we then read, “The authorities have been making claims of taking initiatives to restore Brari Nambal. The Commissioner, Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC), Dr Shafqat Khan said that encroachment will be removed within next few days. We are going to launch a comprehensive demolition drive soon” (GK 22.02.2017). However, not much was undertaken, and in September of the same year, A. S. Wani reported that “inordinate delay in launching conservation measures to restore the glory of Brari Nambal lagoon in Downtown here has pushed the water body on the verge of extinction.” He quoted A. Rasool, a hydraulic engineer and environmentalist, who said, “All the Government has done till now is cosmetic measures for aesthetics while pollution abatement measures remain yet to be implemented and commissioned. The weeded part continues to be there as also the encroachment has not been removed.” Subsequently, Ashraf Wani reported on 20 July 2017: Chief Minister Mehnooba Mufti has inspected the progress on Brari Nambal Revival project under execution of Rs 19.61 crore. The Chief Minister had directed for expediting restauration of the lagoon and asked the Minister for Education Syed Altaf Bukhari to monitor the pace of the project. “Sources said some senior officials of various departments especially Housing and Urban Development are no-serious to restore the lagoon—they are deliberately delaying execution of Brari Nambal Revival project.” (GK 18.09.2017)

Even if funds are finally made available, the subsequent disputes and competition between the departments over the jurisdiction and the assignment of money will hinder a competent and rapid execution of the project. Subsequently, especially due to corruption, the execution of the works was assigned to incompetent stakeholders, and the whole scheme was jeopardized and came to a halt. As a result, in the years to come, the degradation of Brari Nambal will barely be stopped.

On Corruption, Mismanagement, and the Larger Society You shall not take each other’s money illicitly, nor shall you bribe the officials to deprive others of some of their rights illicitly, while you know. —The Quran, 30: 188 It will not be an exaggeration to say that politicians are largely responsible for the deterioration of the topography of the lake as they perceive these areas as rich vote banks to cash on for petty political gains. —Guru and Patloo, KT 14.04.2017

Since about the 1970s, for the umpteenth time, schemes have been worked out and plans have been put into action to save the Dal, but, as Praveen Swami (1998b: 61–65) observed,

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after about two decades in that it was tried to restore the “pristine beauty of the Dal” no significant progress was made despite the many crores that have been given and partly spent to fulfil the task and to observe the law enunciated by the High Court. As S.A. Rashid, a former Chief Engineer who has put together an energetic team of experts in LAWDA, is blunt on this issue. “We have spent Rs 64 crore since 1978 and achieved nothing.”

And in the year 2000 in an article titled “Govt, Not Dal Dwellers Responsible for Lake’s Plight,” Mudasir Yaqoob summarized in more detail the mismatch between the many plans to restore the ecological equilibrium of the lake and the actions taken by the government: The steps taken by authorities for the lake’s conservation have yielded no considerable results. The ecological conditions of the lake have deteriorated with each passing day. Over the years, many restauration plans have been undertaken to rescue Dal. They include Srinagar Master Plan of 1971, Lake Area Master Plan by Stein (1972), Enex Consortium Report (1978), Dal Lake Development Report by Riddle (1985), ODA (1989) Project Report under NLCP (1997) and Project of EHEC Roorke (2000). (GK 01.09.2016)

Over the years, it became clearer and clearer that despite the blame put mainly on the Dal dwellers and owners of houseboats, the pollution of the lake is first and foremost caused by the more than fifteen drains releasing sewage into the lake for which the government is responsible: “The total phosphorous inflow into the lake is about 156.62 tons, of that [only] 4.50 tons are from non-point sources within the lake [e.g., from the lake dwellers] but the rest comes from peripheral areas, mainly through well recognized entry points” (Mudasir Yaqoob, GK 01.09.2016). Until today and as described in chapter 9, through mismanagement and corruption the authorities responsible have not been able to install effective STPs to clean Srinagar’s wastewater before it enters the Dal. Another reason why the deterioration of the Dal and its environment has not been stopped is that construction of houses, shops, and so forth has occurred within two hundred meters of the lake, breaching the law demanding that this space remain unoccupied. This law had been broken continuously by influential and wealthy citizens. On the one hand, LAWDA and other institutions are not able to consistently supervise the area concerned; on the other hand, due to corruption, building activities are tolerated in many cases. Typically, in the years of unrest in the 1980s and 1990s and also in June and July 2016 when protests flared up in the valley, the ongoing encroachments went on undisturbed in and around the Dal, and all activities to rehabilitate Dal Lake came to a halt. In wake of current unrest and the inaction from the state government, the water pollution is now rapidly increasing in all the water bodies, including the picturesque Dal, bringing them to the verge of extinction. Instead of restoring the glory of Dal and bringing it back

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to its original shape, people at the helm of affairs are busy in filling up the coffers not caring a fig for Kashmir. (KO 05.08.2016) Since the 1980s, over and over again, major proposals and action plans have been formulated (Wani et al. 2013: 113), and the High Court has given innumerable orders18 for immediate action that were followed up only half-heartedly or not at all. In this respect, the High Court again in July 2017 termed the functioning of the Monitoring Committee (MC) and the Scientific Advisory Committee (SAC), which had been set up to provide scientific guidance for conservation and management of Dal and Nageen Lakes, as “unsatisfactory” (GK 12.07.2017). But none of these plans and undertakings will stop the deterioration of the lake unless “all stakeholders . . . join hands to save the prized heritage of Kashmir. . . . Everyone is an equal stakeholder in keeping the Dal Lake clean and free from pollution,” as the deputy chief minister, Dr. Nirmal Singh, said when he toured various areas of the Dal (KO 07.12.2017). And two days later, in the same vein, the High Court declared, “It is a collective responsibility of all the people, more particularly the people living around Dal Lake to co-operate with LAWDA authorities and to question their conscience why not to stop deterioration of Dal by exercising restraint” (KO 09.12.2017). In May 2014, the KT reported that “acute corruption and nepotism in the Lakes and Waterways Development Authority [LAWDA] have bogged down the working of the new department since its inception.” This and many other articles published in Kashmir’s dailies may rightly cast the blame on LAWDA for mismanaging the Dal project, because this is the institution that is obliged to finally act according to the statutory provisions to implement the plans to rehabilitate the Dal. However, even if LAWDA’s officers try to assert the law, their hands are often tied because of the intervention of influential stakeholders. These powerful individuals can use their power (and money) to assert their own interests and violate the law, usually without having to fear the consequences. Often, in fact, whenever corrupt and wealthy agents, politicians, and stakeholders are involved and responsible for the mismanagement, LAWDA tilts against windmills if it tries to enforce the law. But in the end, all responsibility and blame is passed to LAWDA alone. This only means that as long as the fate of the lake lies solely in the hands of municipal authorities, powerful stakeholders, and corrupt individuals, there can be no hope of any progress. Here NGOs such as Global Green Peace (which has focused mainly on solid waste management on the lake for the past ten years), Kashmir Concern, and others can be important actors through formulating a set of meaningful measures to restore the beauty of the Dal (see appendix B). Sadly, these NGOs have rarely been supported either by the public or by governmental institutions. Their efforts always remained underfunded or

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Image 10.5. “Kashmir Concern.” Courtesy Touseef Ahmed Bhatt, Srinagar.

not funded at all. Global Green Peace’s activities were even stopped by the government, and “the sources stated its poor performance [was] the reason for withdrawal” (Indian Express 25.03.2009). Today, the main actor is the NGO Kashmir Concern, which hopes to raise public awareness so that a large part of Srinagar’s population will put pressure on the government and the municipal authorities to address the problem seriously. The High Court of Jammu and Kashmir also called on the public when it “held that school, and college students, can be asked to take part in community service programs, focusing especially on clean environment and the lake” (The Hindu 27.04.2017).

If the Dal Lake Dies: The Fate of Its Dwellers What all Dal dwellers have in common is that Dal Lake provides the basis for their livelihood. However, they occupy different niches that they exploit by means of different economic strategies. This, in accordance with the different values the lake and specifically the group-specific habitats have for them, goes hand in hand with the assignment of different views and emotional

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attachments. For the market gardeners, these concern mainly the islands on which they live, the acreage there, and the raised fields on which they grow their vegetables. For the families, these islands are the only place where they can reside. For the houseboat owners, however, home is movable, and wherever it is moored, it is in a habitat that attracts paying guests. For the fisher community, small hamlets on the shore with houses (often on stilts) are their homes, and the different parts of open water are the spaces that are traditionally exploited with different methods for catching the fish they sell in the city. A growing eutrophication of the lake is impinging on all of them, but a final collapse will have distinct effects on these communities—effects that hinge on whether a group’s economic strategy and, thus, its well-being depend directly or only indirectly on the lake. For the owners of houseboats, an ecological equilibrium and thus the scenic beauty of the lake is of utmost importance. A collapse of the lake would discourage tourists from staying on their boats, and this in the long run would surely destroy their economy completely and put some six to seven hundred families out of work. It should not be forgotten that next to the houseboat owners, thousands of families who live fully or at least partly from tourism—such as many of the shikarawalas, the manufacturers of the different souvenirs, and those who bring refreshments and so forth to the houseboats—would also suffer. As Elliot already said in 1982, Houseboats provide popular holiday homes for the thousands of tourists visiting Dal Lake each year. But sewage-polluted waters may soon stop the tourists coming and affect over half of Srinagar’s population involved in the industry. (p. 49)

For the fishing families, it can be supposed that the collapse of the lake would not threaten their livelihood dramatically, because jobs in the city are already far more important for most of them than fishing. Today, the majority of fish sold in the market come from other parts of the country, but next to the tradition of tourist houseboats, the traditions of the Dal fishers will also come to an end. It is not only for the market gardeners but also for the other families who own houses on the islands that the beauty of the lake is of minor or even no interest at all, so that a final collapse of the lake would not mean the end of their culture and livelihood. For the gardeners, only the acreage on the islands or on raised fields counts; and if the lake dies, even more land can be encroached and more raised fields can be constructed so that more vegetables can be grown. Even if the lake shrinks to such an extent that the acreage of lotus fields declines and fewer floating gardens can be constructed, the life of the market gardeners will still not be endangered.

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Islam and Pollution: A Last Word Corruption has appeared in the land and the sea on account of that which men’s hands have wrought, that He may make them taste a part of that which they have done, so that they may return. —The Quran, 30: 41

In Kashmir, moral standards are and should be related to the Islamic canon that constitutes the fundament of all decisions and deeds. However, it seems that solving the problems of a degraded environment and especially curbing the lake’s pollution is understood solely as a sociopolitical and a financial problem. It has rarely been seen in the context of the Islamic creed. In the Quran (30: 41), quoted above, “corruption” can be understood as a warning that polluting and disturbing the environment will fall back on the perpetrator.19 In our context, this should mean that the people of Kashmir, especially those in power, should bear in mind that in Islam, similar to the Christian creed, the environment/nature with all its creatures has to be seen as a sign and symbol of God’s glorious creation and should be cared for. In the words of Izzi Din (1997: 48), The environment is God’s creation. The creation of the earth and all its natural resources is a sign of His wisdom, mercy, power and His other attributes and therefore serves to develop human awareness and understanding of this creator (Quran 13: 2–4; 21: 79). Muslims should seek to protect and preserve the environment because by doing they protect God’s creatures which praise Him.

Or, as Abu Dawud and Tirmidhi declared in one Hadith, Those who are kind and considerate to Allah’s creatures, Allah bestows His kindness and affection on them. Show kindness to the creatures on the earth so that Allah may be kind to you.

The demand that, according to Islam, Muslims should seek to protect and preserve the environment can also be seen in a wider context. Referring to the ongoing environmental degradation in Kashmir, it has been pointed out that “our religion attaches so much significance to cleanliness that it states ‘cleanliness is half of faith.’ If our religion enjoins cleanliness and if we diligently and vigorously follow other religious obligations, why are we remiss in this aspect?” (KO 30.06.2016). But in Kashmir, as in most Islamic societies, there is an unfortunate cognitive distinction between religious and ritual “impurity/pollution” (najasa)20 on the one hand and “environmental impurity/pollution” on the other. Obligations to avoid the first are followed very strictly, but many ignore restrictions against environmental impurity/pollution. As Izzi Dien (2000: 31) explains,

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Muslim scholars have always been clear that all types of impurity, najasa, should not be disposed of in a way that it may contaminate the public water supply. Furthermore, if contamination did accidentally occur then it should be cleaned. In my opinion, factory and other industrial effluent can be considered true impurities, najasa haqiqiyya. However, they may be divided into immediate impurities such as abattoir waste and sewage, delayed impurities such as plastics and polystyrene, poisonous impurities including asbestos.

In a nutshell, it can be said that as long as members of the different strata of society—the political parties in power, the municipal workers in the departments concerned, the various stakeholders, and the general public— forget their religious values and obligations and avoid working together for the common good of saving Dal Lake, its degradation and eutrophication will continue. In regard to the Dal problem, it is Makhdoomi who put this succinctly: Selfishness and greed have become dominant character of our lives, Jhelum and Dal had been chained gasping for breath. . . . We don’t have dust-bins, we have Dal Lake. We don’t have latrines, we have Dal. . . . Almighty has bestowed us with the two to satisfy our needs but not our greed. . . . Let us free Jhelum and Dal before we cry for freedom for ourselves. (KO 17.11.2014)

If the people of Kashmir do not follow these words of advice and subsequently take no interest in their environment and especially in the regeneration of the Dal, and if the so-often mentioned “greedy powerful few” remain in charge and pursue only their self-gratification, it will not be long before the “World Famous Dal Lake” will have become something only to be found in history books.

Notes 1. Here, as so often, “floating gardens” are confused with “raised fields.” Moreover, to forbid the disposal of waterweeds as manure for the fields of the market gardeners would be counterproductive (see chapter 5). 2. The CPI value (score index) relates to the perceived level of public sector corruption on a scale from 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean). 3. Nitrogen is removed in STPs by using fluidized aerobic bioreactors (FAB) to biologically oxidate nitrogen from ammonia to nitrate (nitrification). This is followed by denitrification to reduce nitrate to nitrogen gas. Nitrogen gas is released to the atmosphere and thus removed from the water. 4. In the same year (2013), hotels with more than nineteen rooms were asked to install their own sewage treatment plants (STPs) as per the guidelines of the State Pollution Control Board (SPCB). But when the hotel and restaurant owners said that this would mean closing down their hotels and restaurants if they were pressurized to install their own STPs, these plans were put on ice (GK 13.10.2013).

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5. Sequential batch reactors (SBR) are a type of activated sludge process for treating

6.

7. 8.

9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14.

15.

16.

17.

wastewater. They treat wastewater such as sewage output from anaerobic digesters or mechanical biological treatment facilities in batches. Oxygen is bubbled through the mixture of wastewater and activated sludge to reduce the organic matter (measured as biological oxygen demand [BOD] and chemical oxygen demand [COD]. Typical for the general situation of delays and financial mismanagement is also the acquisition and installation of the trash cleaner at the Chattabal veer in the River Jhelum (GK 30.05.2016). Also, despite the prohibition on the usage of polythene in the valley by the High Court back in 2006 and again in 2008, its use goes unabated, particularly across the city. Still in 2016, the Srinagar Municipal Corporation was unable to control the illegal transport “operated through a mafia” into the valley (KT 27.05.2016). In June 2017, the High Court stated that past orders have “not been implemented in letter and spirit.” And it again urged the government “to make the Dal lake polythene free” (GK 01.06.2017). For the different methods and technologies used to control aquatic weeds, see Velu (1976). In many European languages, the terms “place” and “space” can be traced back to Latin. In English, for instance, since the mid-thirteenth century, “place” connotes a “particular part of space,” and “space,” since the mid-fourteenth century, connotes “ground, land, territory, extension in three dimensions” (https://www.etymonline .com/). In the sense of Heidegger’s Being and Time (1962)/Sein und Zeit (1927). See Jacobsen (1993) for the complexity of meanings for “place” in the Hindu system— to give just one example. www.alternet.org/story/23401/the_messy_clean-up_of_dal-lake. Still in August 2012, LAWDA had reported that only 40 out of 315 kanals of encroached lands had been retrieved (KT 14.08.2012). Here it is important to differentiate between Dal dwellers with their gardens and those families that have settled there but do not cultivate crops. The high number of encroachments on and round Dal Lake in times of disaster or political unrest is mirrored in the number of related articles published in the Kashmir dailies. In the years between 2004 and 2013, only one article concerning illegal constructions next to the lake was found. However, in the month following the big flood in autumn 2014, six such articles were published; and in the time of political unrest between summer 2016 and spring 2017, fifteen articles emerged. They all described how “unscrupulous persons” were taking advantage of the chaotic situation in Srinagar. “Also on the Jhelum [River] bund illegal constructions galore with authorities in slumber. . . . Even after the floods, illegal sheds are being constructed on the embankment . . . under the nose of authorities” (GK 23.0.2016). Again in July 2017, two illegally raised structures at Dalgate Boulevard and Habak were removed by LAWDA enforcement officers (KO 12.07.2017); and again in September, six constructions/structures built in prohibited areas were taken down by LAWDA (KT 09.11.2017). Brari, the elm tree; nambal, a lake choked with vegetation.

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18. For instance, because everywhere in the Dal is littered with plastic objects, in 2007 and again in 2008 a ban on polythene carry bags was imposed by the High Court and the government. However, in 2017, “the [High Court] bench said, the order has not been implemented in letter and spirit” (GK 01.06.2017). 19. For a comprehensive outlook, see “Environment & Ecology in Islam—Article Collection,” http://environment-ecology.com/religion-and-ecology/324-ecolo gy-in-islam.html. 20. “The concept of najasa in Islamic law is rather complex . . . true impurity, najasa haqiqiyya . . . includes any dirt that normally revolts people such as feces, urine and spilt blood” (Izzi Dien 2000: 169n30; see also Hvezda 2007: 41–43).

 Appendix A Kashmir Dailies and Some Other Newspapers and Magazines Consulted Greater Kashmir (GK) (Unless otherwise indicated, articles are by “GK. News Network”) D/M/Y 20.06.2004 18.08.2004 28.11.2005 08.02.2006 18.03.2006 26.08.2006 21.10.2006 23.04.2007 24.04.2007 12.06.2007 14.09.2007

Title Drying up Satisar Save our surroundings Realignment of Houseboats Muharram procession dispersed by force Opposition hammers Govt. on Dal lake Save Dal lake Save dying Dal from becoming a dying Dal Sewage forces drastic changes in vegetation patterns of Dal lake Reduce water level in Dal lake Dal Lake: Save it or see it vanish Committee seeks efforts to save Dal lake

Author Anonymous Shair, S. Anonymous

Haleem, A. Ashraf, M. Bazaz, S. Wani, A. S.

Charag, O. United News India

Appendix A

19.02.2008 07.03.2008 31.03.2008 25.04.2008 04.10.2008 06.05.2008 10.09.2008 16.06.2009 06.07.2009 23.07.2009 05.02.2010 06.02.2010 05.06.2010 25.11.2010 19.04.2011 28.09.2011 20.10.2011 07.12.2011 09.03.2012 18.03.2012 06.04.2012 11.04.2012 24.05.2012 02.06.2012 05.06.2012

The Dal lake and the Kashmiri language Famed Dal, Nageen lake in last throes Encroachment in Dal lake Shia community allege discrimination Dal lake—the dying lake Dal Lake: problems and restauration Vohra directs manual de-weeding of Dal lake Dal Lake cleaning project to miss target Reviving Dal lake: A corporate approach 6,000 plots for families displaced due to Dal lake development Conserving Dal lake Conserving Dal lake Thirty years of Dal lake Pollution Main outflow channel of Dal choked Decaying Dal House boats pollute Dal lake Cooperate in relocation plan to Dole-Demb: CS to HB owners Central Pollution Control Board team reviews Dal conservation Government starts flushing of Dal Flushing exposes hidden pollution in Dal Environmental disaster in making around Da. The perishing Dal lake Deputy CM reviews Dal cleaning Hoteliers suggest China model to contain pollution in Dal lake Squeezing Dal lake—Historical perspective

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Anonymous Wani, A. S. Hussain, S. S. Wani, I. Wani, A. S.

Asghar, N. Drabu, H. A.

Ranu, M. M. Ranu, M. Kundangar, M. R. D. Wani, A. S. Iqbal, F. Anonymous Wani, A. S. Wani, A. S. Maqbool, Z. Wanis, A. S. Kak, A. M.

Kundangar, M. R. D.

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05.08.2012 29.08.2012 04.09.2012 21.09.2012 25.09.2012 19.11.2012 24.11.2012 21.02.2013 14.03.2013 02.06.2013 24.08.2013 29.08.2013 11.10.2013 15.10.2013 27.10.2013 31.10.2013 03.11.2013 23.02.2014 09.03.2014 22.03.2014 06.05.2014 12.05.2014 14.05.2014 02.07.2014 08.07.2014

“Removing weeds from the Dal lake” Weeds, Azolla takes sheen off Dal The other side of Azolla The two faces of Dal Azolla filiculoids misinterpreted Dal lake losing its glory Police foil Muharram processions 20 structures demolished in Dal lake Dal lake gets first dockyard Dr Karan Singh concerned over Dal lake plight Weeds, Azolla deface Dal lake Preserving an asset. (WILLOWS) Brari Nambal lagoon near extinction Pollution takes toll on Brari Nambal fauna Govt. expedites rehabilitation of Dal dwellers Govt finds Dal weeds economically viable Dal lake’s vital interior channels choked 1,370 new illegal constructions come up around Dal Lake: Govt. Govt contests on Dal water expanse Pilot project tested successfully Pulls up LAWDA for allowing run-offs into water body Demolition drive in Dal lake politically motivated: PDP Restauration measures should be informed SC directs JK to restore Dal lake Move forces suspension of de-weeding, dredging operations

Anonymous Wani, A. S. Khan, M. A. Iqbal, F. Kak, M. Wani, R. A. Yusuf, S. I.

Anonymous Wani, A. S. Chat, Z.A. Wani, A. S. Wani, A. S. Wani, A. S. Wani, A. S. Wani, A. S. Anonymous Wani, A. S. Wani, A. S. Rashid, D. A.

Rasool, S. Press Trust India Wani, A. S.

Appendix A

16.07.2014 22.07.2014 12.08.2014 16.08.2014 01.09.2014 18.09.2014 23.09.2014 24.09.2014 01.10.2014 01.10.2014 02.10.2014 02.10.2014 02.10.2014 04.10.2014 05.10.2014 09.10.2014 23.10.2014 30.10.2014 20.11.2014 03.12. 2014

Funds stopped; Excessive weeds can trigger eutrophication GAD can better explain present status: Secretary Housing In the next 17 years there will be no space left in Srinagar From 50,000 a decade ago, number of woodcarvers shrink Flood fury fuels constructions in Dal greenbelt We cannot at all claim to be innocent Major floods cannot be stopped but can be managed Domestic generators procured to flush out flood water JK delays flood project: CWC Flood fury fuels constructions in Dal greenbelt Illegal constructions galore everywhere Govt closed eyes to Jhelum deterioration JK, CWC pass the buck over Jhelum flood project Vandalized Kashmir wetlands no longer absorb flood waters Focus on how to prevent such disasters in future Floods devastated Dal lake, neighborhood The “Paradise” lost! People must lodge complaints against profiteers Disclose policy on flood affected people in Dal Illegal constructions demolished in Zakura: IFCD

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Wani, A. S. Ali, M. Editorial Akmali, M. Wani, A. S. Anonymous Madni, ER S. R. S. Ali, M. Maqbool, U. Wani, A. S. GK City Corresp. Wani, A. S.

Wani, A. S. Press Trust India Hussain, T. Ashraf, M. Akmali, M. Rashid, D. A. Annonymous

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07.01.2015 19.02.2015 23.02.2015 02.03.2015 16.03.2015 23.03.2015 14.04.2015 15.04.2015 27.04.2015 03.06.2015 09.12.2015 20.07.2015 22.10.2015 22.11.2015 20.01.2016 30.05.2016 06.06.2016 23.06.2016 29.06.2016

After civil lines, illegal constructions mushroom in Dal lake HC to Govt: “Decide on shifting flood-affected people of Dal lake” CAPD for facilitating direct sale of vegetables to contain prices Inhabitants of flood prone areas accuse IFCD Was Kashmir flooding a man-made disaster? Flood threat continues to loom over J&K Huge investment needed for Jheum conservation Start strengthening the embankment, and drudging the beds Jhelum embankment in Srinagar vulnerable to breaches: Experts Panel to seek parliament’s push for flood control program Locals pitch for conservation of Brari Nambal Eid: Don’t forget flood victims Shiite mourners teargassed in Kashmir capital Govt fails in litmus test to restore Brari Nambal Div. Com. for restoring glory of Dal lake 7 years on, authorities fail to install trash cleaner New master plan proposes Srinagar expansion Illegal constructions galore on Jhelum bund House passes resolution for preservation of water bodies

GK City Correspond. Rashid, D. A.

Yaqoob, M. Narain, S. Bashir, A. Rashid, D. A. Editorial Wani, A. S. Ali, M.

Maghribi Khan, A. Bashir, A. Wani, A. S. GK News Network Yaqoob, M.

Appendix A

13.07.2016 24.07.2016 24.07.2016 05.08.2016 08.08.2016 10.08.2016 15.08.2016 18.08.2016 29.08.2016 01.09.2016 05.09.2016 20.09.2016 28.09.2016 09.10.2016 10.10.2016 19.10.2016 18.10.2016 21.02.2017 22.02,2017

Taking advantage of unrest Undue advantage of unrest Illegal structures coming up at Saida Kadal, adjoining areas Admid restrictions, local growers meet vegetable demand Politician-violator nexus facilitates illegal constructions LAWDA undertakes demolition at Saida Kadal, Nageen Tourism sector in Kashmir worst affected by unrest Baba demb residents decry illegal constructions LAWDA removes four illegal structures around Dal lake Ecological changes pushing Dal to gradual extinction HC directs Dal encroachment to file surety, bail bond Dal vegetables suffice Srinagar’s demand LAWDA demolishes 3 illegal structures Muharram processions take out at the interior Muharram processions foiled in Srinagar Dal Conservation: High court directs police to Proceed in FIR CCTVs cameras to be set-up around Dal Reinvigorating horticulture sector and checking spurious pesticides Authorities sit over encroachment of Brari Nambal

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Yacoob, M. Bhat, Raja M. GK News Network Akmali, M. Akmali, M.

GK Web Desk Yaqoob, M. Rashid, D. A. Akmali, M.

Yaqoob, M. Rashid, D. A.

Iqbal, F. Yaqoob, M.

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03.05.2017 15.05.2017 24.05.2017 01.06.2017 12. 07.2017 09.11.2017 18.09.2017 20.09.2017 12.12.2017 18.12.2017 25.04.2018

SMC sits on waste segregation Rehabilitating Dal dwellers: Kashmir Welfare Trust shows the way Encroached land retrieved at Brari Nambal HC for making Dal lake polythene free Dal lake conservation: HC terms functioning . . . unsatisfactory LAWDA withholds royalty charges Govt. in slumber as Brari Nambal lagoon near extinction Destroying nature PIL on water bodies: HC directs Govt to file report State-of-art housing colony inaugurated at Rakh-e-Arth HC asks Govt to implement waste management system in tourist resorts

Musasir. Y. Wani, S.W.

Rashid, D. A. Rashid, D. A.

Wani, A. S. Mehdi, A. S. A. GK correspondent

Rashid, D. A.

Kashmir Times (KT) (Unless otherwise indicated, articles are by “KT News Service”) D/M/Y 20.06.2003 20.05.2011 18.07.2011

14.08.2012 28.08.2012 07.09.2012

Title Centre to contribute 70 ps for Dal lake revival (On houseboats and pollution) Tourist rush raises pollution levels. No monitoring increases threat to environment PIL on Dal lake conservation: HC asked govt to file response Increasing pollution declines Dal’s water quality J&K lacks water pollution policy

Author

Malik, B.

Mohiuddin, A. Mohiuddin, A.

Appendix A

22.11.2012 08.12.2012 21.12.2012 15.05 2013 18.06.2013 12.08.2013 23.11.2013 12.05.2014 16.06.2014 24.09.2014 05.02.2015 28.02.2015 29.03.2015 07.04.2015 07.04.2015 14.04.2015 28.04.2015 22.10.2015 22.12.2015 22.12.2015 27.10.2015

Sagar for expeditious completion of on-going city Projects No check on water pollution Ensure pollution free Dal lake Expedite settlement process of Dal dwellers at Rakhi-i-Arth: Jora Absent water pollution policy Governor reviews implementation of 09.11.2013 Efficacy of STP’s around Dal lake Demolition drive in Dal lake politically motivated: Expedite settlement process of Dal dwellers at Rakh-i-Arth: Jora Srinagar’s tourism business shattered after flood Relishing Kashmir’s dried veggies in winter Spurious pesticides damage fruit crops Banks caution people against fake calling scam Relief, rehabilitation of flood underways. Opposition protests in LA. “Govt failed to reach out:. . .” SMC demolition drive turns violent on Srinagar city outskirts Mufti tours Srinagar: Taking on spot review of ongoing projects Won’t allow Muharram procession today. . . Illegal structures: HC asks LAWDA Illegal constructions SVC summons VC LAWDA Mufti directs ERA to deliver project within time

Editorial

Editorial

Sayed, S.

Syed, F.

Yasir, S.

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25.11.2015 24.03.2016 16.05.2016 27.05.2016 30.05.2016 01.06.2016 02.06.2016 09.06.2016 30.08.2016 15.10.2016 14.04.2017 09.11.2017 21.04.2018

CM holds meeting with DC, HoDs of Kashmir valley HC for strict action against illegal constructions HC asks committee to evolve permanent mechanisms Polythene free Kashmir: Despite the Syed, F. ban use of poly bags Encroachment on forest lands K.T. Editorial Visiting World Bank mission team calls on MC PTL on conservation of Dal lake: HC asks Govt. to comply: Rs 1577-Cr flood management scheme underway Amidst unrest illegal structures galore . . . LAWDA demolishes 5 illegal structures . . . Who is polluting the Dal Lake? Guru, B. and Patloo, T. LAWDA continues demolition drive against illegal constructions Tourist spots in Valley, Ladakh region declared “no polythene zone”

Kashmir Observer (KO) (Unless otherwise indicated, articles are by Observers News Service) D/M/Y 19.10.2012 31.10.2012 07.11.2012 29.11.2012

Title Author Committee on estimates recommends preservation Realign houseboats in Dal lake: HC Rs 3.40 crore being utilised on two dockyards in Dal lake EC Seeks expert advice on conserving valley water bodies

Appendix A

07.12.2012 15.12.2012 22.12.2012 13.02.2013 17.06.2013 03.07.2013 16.07.2013 22.07.2013 11.10.2013 23.10.2013 23.10.2013 04.01.2014 23.02.2014 12.06.2014 08.07.2014 26.09.2014 06.11.2014 12.11.2014 17.11.2014 09.12.2014

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Rs.57 Cr spent on land acquisition, rehabilitation Dal’s last lifeline too being destroyed Rs. 57 Cr spent on land acquisition, rehabilitation of Dal dwellers Scores of illegal city constructions demolished A rectification of the Dal dilemma: Zarka, S. LAWDA Omar for disaster management agency on US pattern NC responsible for stinking, unhygienic Srinagar: PDP Omar directs shrinking Dal rehab project to 3 yrs United Dal environment association formed Dal dwellers decry delay in rehab plan Sagar directs for de-weeding, beautification of Brari Nambal Rakh-e-Aarath colony home for Dal dwellers 1370 new illegal constructions come up around Dal lake: Govt. Doomed Dal: reckless constructions fast eating up lakeshore Hand over Dal lake to UN, ODP tells Govt. 900 shikaras, 300 dongas, 600 houseboats damaged Floods: Sharing the blame Vote bank politics: “Raise illegal structures but vote for us” Freedom for Dal & Jhelum Makhadoomi, J. Dal dwellers victim of bad governance: Meraj

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13.01.2015 20.01.2015 18.03.2015 24.03.2015 08.06.2015 11.06.2015 22.10.2015 20.01.2016 22.01.2016 30.01.2016 01.02.2016 30.06.2016 05.08.2016 08.08.2016 07.09.2016 05.10.2016 10.10.2016 15.10.2016 17.10.2016

Winter is here; can spring be far behind? Tourism sector passing through turbulent times: Talat Flood victims accuse patwari of providing fake cheques Community engagement vital for Akhter, N. sustainable tourism Protection of nature must for survival of gen next: Mirwaiz Nageen lake’s glory to be restored: Mir. By Karkera Won’t allow 8th Muharram procession: Police Has corruption become embedded in Kashmir?Javaid, A. Illegal constructions galore in prohibited area Rakh-e-Arth not suitable place for people: Dal dwellers Leaving bigh fish, LAWDA preys Sidiq, N. upon poor What would it take to make Srinagar clean and green again? Dal lake on the verge of extinction, courtesy LAWDS LAWDA warns action against land grabbers LAWDA continues demolition drive, demolished 10 illegal structures in Sgr Shia-Sunni unity, the need of the hour Govt uses force to stop 8th Muharram procession Fresh algae blooms threatens the Wani, R. Dal lake Despite anti-encroachment drive, illegal structures continue

Appendix A

19.10.2016 21.02.2017 06.09.2017 12.07.2017 13.08.2017 20.08.2017 15.09.2017 26.09.2017 27.09.2017 28.09.2017

02.10.2017 13.10.2017

22.10.2017 26.10. 2017 25.11.2017 07.12.2017 09.12.2017 16.12.2017

LAWDA to install CCTVs around Dal Dal dwellers stage protest against LAWDA Dal should be visible with no weeds Marouf, A. Illegal structures at Dalgate, Habak demolished De-weeding progress at Dal lke reviewed Vision document for preservation of Dal, Nageen Lakes discussed Asiea launches Dal de-weeding, solid waste collection drive CS chairs Dal monitoring comittee meeting Governor flags off Dal lake’s de-weeding, cleanliness drive Drive to remove waterlily from Dal Marouf, Ali shall continue at “enhanced pave”: HC Pained at Dal situation, Mehbooba directs speeding up ofcleaning of lake Mehbooba visits Dal interior, directs immediate removal of junk At Nishat Ghat Asiea for scientific approach in conservation of Dal, Nageen lakes HC directs up-grading of STPs amid “sewage inflow” into Dal House Committee on environment visits Dal lake Dy CM calls for coordinated effort to keep Dal lake clean HC asks people to stir conscience on “ailing Dal” DC Srinagar calls for proper planning before starting work on project

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Kashmir Reader (KR) D/M/Y 30.06.2015 14.01.2016 14.01.2016 19.01.2016 24.01.2016 30.01.2016 01.02.2016 02.02.2016 04.02.2016 22.02.2016 27.02. 2016 07.03.2016 25.03.2016 25.03.2016 25.03.2016 14.04.2016 17.04.2016

Title Inefficient SPs leading to growth of harmful weeds in Dal lake HC seeks police, SMC’s explanation over illegal constructions HC asks PCB to check, analyse discharges added to Dal LAWDA “vision document” to decide fate of Dal land mass Rakh-e-Arth rehab: Only 938 of 2,538 households shifted from Dal Increasing tourist arrivals detrimental for environment: govt report Waguv manufacturers dump the craft as demand slumps Teenager attempts immolation to protest demolition drive LAWDA demolition drive biased in favour of hotels: protestors IIT Roorkee to prepare vision document Dal by July 2016 UNDP sponsors a comprehensive interdisciplinary project Dal nadru growers approach counterparts in other lakes Why shouldn’t your hotel be closed, HC asks owners Dal preservation: HC wants matter settled “once and for all’ LAWDA issues: Governor puts officials in top gear Govt wakes up to Dal encroachment, dirty city Dal preservation: CS, other babus appear before HC

Author Mohammad, M Parray, M. A. Parray, M. A. Parray, M. A. Parray, M. A. Mohammad, M. Mohamin, M. Ali, J. Ul Islam, F. Rarray, M. A. A Reader A Reader Rarray, M. A. Parray, M. A. A Reader A Reader Parray, M. A.

Appendix A

28.04.2016 05.08.2016 05.09.2016 09.09.2016 30.10.2018

CS-led panel formed to devise permanent mechanisms Illegal structures razed in Dal, Budgam HC appoints 2 “vigilance commissioners” Realign houseboats on Dal immediately: Mufti to LAWDA HC seeks status report on solid waste management action plan

Parray, M. A. A Reader Array, M. A. Admin. Sidiq, N.

The Hindu (Unless otherwise indicated, authors were not given) D/M/Y 20.03.2002 15.06.2003 31.07.2003 20.05.2004 20.06.2004 27.11.2004 12.03.2005 13.03.2005 26.03.2005 08.05.2006 29.08.2006 18.10.2006 27.04.2017 02.12.2017

Title Plan to protect Dal Special package for Dal lake conservation likely Dal lake “dwellers” to be relocated Mufti for improving Dal An SOS for the Dal Dal lake gets a new lease of life Centre approaches . . . Centre approves Dal lake conservation project Parliamentary panel flays J&K Govt. on Dal lake Court asks Govt to identify land for Dal dwellers UNESCO heritage tag for Dal lake sought Two treatment plants for Dal lake . . . Pulls up authorities for failing” to check encroachment on the water body CAG report expresses concern over state

Author

Puri, L. Puri, L.

Ashiq, P.

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Other Newspapers and Magazines D/M/Y 05.03.1998 15.09.1982 09.02.1985 01.11.1989 06.02.2002 30.03.2007

25.03.2009 29.06.2009 28.12.2010

21.10.2011

03.04.2014 12.05.2014 02.02.2016

Newspaper Frontline India Today Indian Express Global Topic The Times of India Reuters UK

Title To save a lake Boom or bust Dal lake falls on bad days Tourism in Kashmir Funds for Dal lake vanish As insurgency ebbs, Kashmir looks to save Dal The Indian Express Extensive efforts by NGO to clean up Dal lake The Independent Kashmir: Paradise once again? Indian Express 600 structures demolished under Dal lake . . . Rising Kashmir Houseboat owners decline proposed shifting of houseboats The Times of India Bangalore brains set to revive ailing Dal lake The Times of India Realignment of Dal lake houseboats Rising Kashmir Preserving Wetlands

Author Swami. P. Dilip, B. Saxena, R. Anonymous Anonymous Scrutton, A.

Bushra, S. Buncombe, A. Anonymous

Tuman, A.A.

Anonymous Tantry, I. Reshi, S. A.

 Appendix B Suggestions to “Save the Lake” by Touseef Ahmed Bhatt, Chairman of Kashmir Concern (Communicated 22 June 2016) • Implementing an effective monitoring mechanism for monitoring the Dal Lake conservation program, which should comprise of eminent limnologists, researchers, experts who have been associated closely with Dal Lake studies during the last three decades, as well as eminent engineers, foresters, and academicians. • Scouting out the possibility of handing over the Dal Lake execution program to an international agency/organization well known for lake conservation and management practices. • Prioritizing the works for Dal conservation and completion of jobs in stipulated time frame. • Rehabilitating displaced Dal dwellers, keeping in view their socioeconomic conditions. • Effectively enacting laws for encroachments, conservation of open water bodies with floating gardens, land masses. • Restricting vegetable gardens, floating gardens from growing of lily pads, Nadru cultivation, and demarcation of zones for such activities. • Aerating, oxidating, and ozonizing of waters affected with algal blooms under close scientific monitoring. • Formulating management practices with assessment of current threats to aquatic biodiversity, including fish and water bird species as per wetland rules.

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• Designing an ecotourism development plan based on the carrying capacity of the lake and with proper alignment of houseboats as envisaged in the project. • Scouting out the possibility of biotech method (constructed wetland treatment compartments) for wastewater treatment as in vogue in Canada, Italy, the United States, and other European Countries. • Devising a method for houseboat sanitation, e.g. floating septic tank with proper solid-waste management, through NGOs and eco-activists. • Implementing awareness campaigns through NGOs and educational institutions and strictly adhering to the Water Act 1974. • Marking executing agencies accountable before the monitoring cell body overlooking the Dal conservation program. • Promoting research and development activities through online monitoring devices as in Japan. • Cleansing and maintaining peripheral springs and diverting their freshwaters to supplement water budgets. • Empowering LAWDA and allocating the appropriate number of enforcement staff. • Deploying hydrological and environmental engineers for efficient management of lake in place of the existing inexperienced ones. • Integrating control of Dal Lake, associated water bodies, and its waterways. • Demarcating Dal Lake with GIS mapping on the pattern of Wular Lake. • Revisiting the rehabilitation of Dal Dwellers Scheme at Rakhi Arth in the larger interests of the wetland ecosystem and the sustained livelihood of the residents. • Incorporating environmental experts on the Special Committee under the chief secretary constituted by the government.

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 Index Abdullah, Omar, 240 Ạbu’l Fażl, Allámi, 63, 120, 150 acreage productivity in relation to, 128 remote sensing data for estimating, 129–32 adoption systems, 122, 123–24, 146nn7–8 agricultural year cultivation decision-making and constraints in, 127–28 first cycle of, 124–25 second cycle of, 125–26 Aín i Akbari (Ạbu’l Fażl), 63, 120, 150 Ali, M., 184–85, 218 all-season vegetables monthly availability of, 136 most important, 125–26 amusement parks, 256–57 animal feed, 111–12 anthropology, 1–2 APC/ODA. See Atkins Planning Consultants Overseas Development Administration arable land households in relation to ownership of, 119 loss of, 145 ownership distribution sample of, 117–18 ranking distribution of ownership, 118 yield estimation from island, 132–33 Arfat, S., 184–85, 218

artificial soil, 69 arts. See crafts Atkins Planning Consultants Overseas Development Administration (APC/ODA) on degradation, 190, 234 on resettlement, 235–36, 237 Azolla emergence of, 211–12 nutrients absorbed by, 92, 115n9 Aztecs, 67, 78n13, 79n16 Bahāristān-i Shāhῑ, 36, 42n37 bahātsh houseboats, 21, 22 Bakkarwal nomads, 1 Bano, H., 145, 251–52 Bellew, H. W., 209 Bernier, Francois, 10, 166–67 Bhatt, Touseef Ahmed, 226, 283–84 biome, 16–18 biotopes, 15 Al-Biruni, 60–61 Biscoe, C. E. Tyndale, 121, 152 bitter gourd, 127 Bobb, D., 198, 251 bottle gourd, 127 Boulevard Road, 214n7 hotel invasion on, 198 houseboat relocation and realignment, 247–49 STP issues on, 226 Brari Nambal lagoon, 257–59

310

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Index

British sportsmen, 151 Bruce, C. G., 50 Buddhism, 40n1 calcium, 200–202 carpets and shawls, 168–70, 176nn11–12 carp fish, 4, 180, 181–82 cast nets, 177–78 catchment area of Dal Lake, 15 nitrogen and phosphorus influx from, 192–93 Ceratophyllum, 88–89, 95, 115n12, 209 Char Chenar island, 66, 67 chemical fertilizer degradation from, 96, 195 nitrogen and phosphorus from, 195, 204–5 price of, 146n10 chemophysical water properties, 92–94 chinampas, 67, 78n13, 79n16 cholera epidemics, 11, 204 climate change, 2 commissions, 164–65 Commonwealth Fund for Technical Cooperation, 189 community classification, 44–46 compensation, resettlement, 237–44 compost mud added to, 91, 92 nutrient content of, 94–96 pH values of, 95 waterweeds made into, 88–91 conductivity, 92–94, 200–201 cones (pōkurs and tulche), 98–100 conservation. See degradation countermeasures constructions, illegal, 250–57, 266nn14–16 contested places Dal dwellers, 233–37 houseboat owners, 245–46 conversion. See Islamization corruption in degradation countermeasures, 259–62

Islam on, 264 issue of, 250 in J & K, 221 in LAWDA, 223, 261 scale, 221, 265n2 countermeasures. See degradation countermeasures crafts introduction of Kashmiri, 165–67 lacquered object, 170–72 papier-mâché, 170 shawl and carpet, 168–70, 176nn11–12 Sunni and Shia divide in, 167 cucurbits monthly availability of, 137 most important, 127 cultivation. See production and cultivation Dal Gate, 16, 78n6, 204 Dal Lake. See specific topics Dal Lock Gate, 247 ḍāmaras, 28, 30, 32, 33, 40n11, 41n20 Dapper, Olfert, 66–67, 79n15 degradation. See also pollution APC/ODA studies on, 190, 234 articles published on, increase in, 219–20 of Brari Nambal lagoon, 257–59 from chemical fertilizer, 96, 195 electrolytes concentration and, 200–202 eutrophication and, 199 fate of Dal Dwellers concerning, 262–63 houseboat tourism and hotels impacting, 196–99 India and J & K government studies on, 190 Kashmir University study on, 189 macrophytes interrelationships and, 209–14 Muslims regarding, 264–65 nitrogen and phosphorus concentration and, 202–9 from population growth, 190–93, 214n1

Index

from sewage, 96, 190–93, 208 from silting, sedimentation, and encroachment, 193–95 of wetlands, 195–96, 197 degradation countermeasures attempts overview, 221 Bhatt suggestions on, 283–84 Brari Nambal lagoon failures in, 257–59 Commonwealth Fund for Technical Cooperation, 189 contested places regarding, 233–37, 245–46 corruption and mismanagement in, 259–62 demolition of illegal construction and encroachment, 250–57, 266nn14–16 de-weeding operations, 196, 224, 227–30 DPR proposal on, 219 houseboat relocation and realignment plan, 247–49 NGOs supporting, 261–62 NIUA recommendations on, 218–19 polythene ban, 214n9, 266n6, 267n18 proposals and deficiencies, 217–21 public trust regarding, 218 resettlement, 184–85, 234–45 STPs, 221–27, 265–66nn3–5 Demb Hanz definition and classification of, 44, 45, 54, 81 as subgroup of Hanjis, 55 ḍēmbs. See raised fields demolition, 250–57, 266nn14–16 dendrochronology, 88 Detailed Project Report Conservation and Management Plan (DPR), 219 de-weeding operations criticism of, 196, 224 harvesters for, 227–30 Dogra, Sant Ram, 123 Dogra Rule, 121 Dole Demb area, 59n26 houseboat relocation and realignment in, 248–49

•

311

influence from, 56 map of, 82 doongas. See dunga houseboats Doughty, M., 53 DPR. See Detailed Project Report Conservation and Management Plan Draft Master Plan, 244–45 dredging LAWDA on, 96 nets for, 91, 92 dried vegetables (hokh syun), 110–11, 116n18 dunga houseboats descriptions of, 150–52 entrance of, 155 evolution of, 152–54 old style, 21, 22, 153 sewage from, 192–93 ecology basics, 13–16 economic diversification, 140–43 economic history, 18–23 electrolytes, 200–202 encroachment degradation from, 193–95 demolition of illegal construction and, 250–57, 266nn14–16 by hotels, 251–52 interrelation between silting, sewage, macrophytes and, 212–14 J & K mandates on, 250–51 environmental degradation. See degradation; degradation countermeasures Environment Protection Act (1986), 218 epidemics, 11, 157, 204 Ermens, G., 71–74, 110 Escherichia coli, 193 ethnonyms, 56–57 eutrophication, 199 FABs. See fluidized aerobic bioreactors famine from floods, 144 Kashmir impacted by, 77n5 shawl industry hurt by, 169

312

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Index

Farmers Welfare Organization, 243 fish carp, 4, 180, 181–82 cast nets for catching, 177–78 decline in population of, 181–82 harpoon for catching, 180 imports of, 179–80 Schizothorax, 4, 181–82, 183, 185 techniques for drying, 178–79 total weight of caught, 182 Fishermen Community, 184–85 fishers (Gad Hanz) art of fishing by, 177–81 definition and classification of, 44, 45 economic situation of, 183–84 income of, 180–81, 184 resettlement of, 184–85 sustainability issues for, 181–84 traditional settlement of, 178 floating farms, 72–74 floating ferns. See Azolla; Salvinia floating gardens arrangement of, 73 characteristics of, 68 chinampas as, 67, 78n13, 79n16 construction of, 96–103 cucurbits raised on, 127 flood protection from, 69 lattice, 100–101 map shawl showing, 74 moving, 102–3 in nineteenth and twentieth centuries, 68–75 origins of, 61–66 pōkurs and tulche for, 98–100 raised fields created from old, 86 terminological confusions about, 67–68 theft of, 63, 64–65, 71 uniqueness of, 245 as water influx preparation, 108–10 yield estimation from, 134 floating islands, 66–67 floating raft-gardens, 71–72 Floating Vegetable Market dependence on, 143–45 importance of, 145, 236

location of, 139 tourist shops near, 139–40, 141 floods, 77n3 dangers of recurring, 62–63 devastation from, 78n6, 108, 110, 163–64 famine from, 144 floating gardens protecting against, 69 houseboat tourism impacted by, 163–64 from Jhelum River, 206 water nuts as insurance during, 113 fluidized aerobic bioreactors (FABs), 222, 223, 224, 226, 265n3 food security, 143–45 Foucault, M., 230–31 Gad Hanz. See fishers Gagribal basin, 247 Global Green Peace, 261–62 gotra names, 29–31 gourds, 127 greed, 235, 251, 258, 265 greengrocers, 140 habitats, 15 Haidar Mālik Chādūrah, 61, 63, 77n4 Hamadānῑ, Mīr Sayyid ‘Ali, 34–35, 42n30, 65, 165 hamlets, 1, 81, 103, 115n1 Hanafi law, 47 Handoo, J. K., 95, 227 Hangloo, R. L., 28 Hanjis decline of original, 149 definition and classification of, 45, 54–56 Demb Hanz as subgroup of, 55 hierarchy within, 50 negative reputation of, 58n24 Hanz, 44, 45, 52–54, 81 harpoon (nāruṭsh), 180 harvester machines, 227–30 harvesting animal feed, 111–12 lesser bulrush, 114

Index

lotus rhizomes, 104–6 water nuts, 112–14 waterweeds, 89–90 Hasan, M., 38 Hazratbal basin conductivity in, 200 nitrogen and phosphorus in, 205 sedimentation and silting in, 194 HBOA. See Houseboat Owners Association hierarchies, 49–52 Hindus/Paṇḍits, 40nn3–4 adoption system, 124 community classification of, 44–45 emergence and structure of Kashmiri, 26–29 factions of, 29, 40nn8–9 gotra and kram names, 29–31 as language translators, 28–29, 40nn6–7 Rishi movement, 42n30 systematic conversion of, 33–36 hokh syun (dried vegetables), 110–11, 116n18 hotels degradation impacts from, 196–99 encroachment by, 251–52 houseboat life, 156 houseboat owners. See also Hanjis; houseboat tourism contested place, 245–46 dependency on tourists, 172, 173 inheritance among, 175 kinship diagram of marriages, 174 marriage among, 172–75 peddlers working with, 164–65, 172, 173 products sold to, 176n9 relocation and realignment plan, 247–49 selling a boat among, 175 Houseboat Owners Association (HBOA), 158, 247–49 houseboats bahātsh, 21, 22 dunga, 21, 22, 150–55, 192–93

•

313

on Jhelum River, 153, 156 lineup of modern, 157 luxurious, 150, 156–61, 176n6 relocation and realignment of, 247–49 sewage from, 192–93, 246 houseboat tourism boom in, 154 degradation impacts from, 196–99 early twentieth century to present day, 154–61 emergence and evolution of, 149–54 floods impacting, 163–64 investments in, 152–54, 157–58 risks with, 161–64 statistics, 162–64 households arable land ownership in relation to, 119 income estimation of individual, 138–39 Hügel, Charles von, 169 Humboldt, Alexander, 67, 78n13, 79n16 ILEC. See International Lake Environment Committee Foundation income commissions from tourists, 164–65 economic diversification for augmenting, 140–43 estimation of potential, 138–39 of fishers, 180–81, 184 India government, 190 inflow streams, 15–16 inheritance regarding adoption, 123–24, 146nn7–8 among houseboat owners, 175 kinship diagram, 122 land ownership and systems of, 119–23 International Lake Environment Committee Foundation (ILEC), 2, 13 Iranian leaders, 48–49 irrigation artificial soil and, 69 iron pot used for, 87–88 Isenberg, S. B., 151–52

314

•

Index

Ishaq, M., 210–11 Islam, 264–65. See also Muslims Islamization fate of Shia minority during, 36–39 origins of, 31–33 Rishi movement and, 42n30 systematic conversion, 33–36 islands raised fields forming new, 86–87 yield estimation from arable land on, 132–33 yield estimation from floating gardens near, 134 Jammu and Kashmir ( J & K) State corruption in, 221 degradation studies by, 190 encroachments mandates of, 250–51 on illegal construction, 254 PCB, 224, 226, 227, 265n4 on STPs, 222–23, 226 on wetlands, 196 Jhelum River flooding from, 206 houseboats on, 153, 156 J & K. See Jammu and Kashmir State Jonarāja, (Rājataraṅgiṇī), 33, 35, 40n6, 41n19, 52 Jora, N. R., 239, 242–43 Kalhaṇa, 18–19, 32–33 Kashmir. See also Jammu and Kashmir State agricultural year in, 124–28 as Buddhism stronghold, 40n1 famine impacting, 77n5 Hindu society emergence and structure in, 26–29 Islamization in, 31–39, 42n30 Jewel of, 5 map shawl of, 74 parallel worlds in, 10–11, 24n5 regional division of, 57n4 regional map of, 12 social structure of contemporary, 44–57

Valley of, 9–13, 20 waterways and economic history of, 18–23 wetland cultivation beginnings in, 60–61 Kashmir Concern Bhatt as chairman of, 283–84 efforts of, 261–62 Kashmiri Brahmans. See Hindus/Paṇḍits Kashmir University, 189 Kashmir Welfare Trust, 244 Kaul, R., 198, 251 Kaul, V., 62, 67–68, 95, 202, 210–11, 227 Kaw, M. K., 121 Khan, Abdullah, 63–65 Khan, Ishaq, 34, 50 Khan, M. I., 144, 153 khashū (special net), 91, 92 kinship diagram economic diversification, 142 houseboat owner marriages, 174 inheritance and adoption, 122 kram names, 58n17 meaning and function of, 29–31 zāt names in relation to, 40n14, 46–47 Kundangar, Muhammad Rashid-ud-Din, 222 lacquered objects, 170–72 lacustrine economy dependence on, 143 in nineteenth and twentieth centuries, 68–77 profit estimation from, 136–39 Lake Chalco, 67, 79n16 lakes, importance of, 2 Lakes and Waterways Development Authorities (LAWDA) corruption in, 223, 261 de-weeding operations by, 196, 224 on dredging, 96 founding of, 214n8 houseboat relocation and realignment plan, 247–49 regarding illegal construction and encroachment, 253–57, 266n16

Index

on resettlement and compensation, 239–44 STPs managed by, 222–24, 226 Lake Xochimilco, 67, 79n16 land ownership adoption systems and, 122, 123–24, 146nn7–8 arable, 117–19 distribution sample of, 117–18 inheritance systems and, 119–23 ranking distribution of, 118 landscapes, pristine, 9–10, 23n2 lattice, 100–101 LAWDA. See Lakes and Waterways Development Authorities Lawrence, Walter Roper, 74–76, 80n21, 112, 123, 150–51, 193 lesser bulrush, 114 liwan (paddle-like tool), 101 long boat (parandh), 21, 23 lotus gardens increase in, 102, 103 ownership distribution sample of, 117–18 production and cultivation of, 104–7 ranking distribution of ownership, 118 yield estimation from, 134–36 lotus rhizomes classification of water areas containing, 135 harvesting, 104–6 importance of, 113–14, 144 monthly availability of, 137 nutritional value of, 115n15 yield estimation of, 134–36 Low, S., 230, 231, 233 luxurious/upper-class houseboats, 176n6 bedroom, 161 construction of, 158 ground plan of, 159 living room, 160 on Nageen Lake, 160 origins of, 150, 156–57 macrophytes. See also waterweeds biomass, 94, 95, 96, 115n9

•

315

degradation and interrelationships of, 209–14 importance of, 92 interrelation between sedimentation, nutrients and, 209–11 interrelation between silting, sewage, encroachment and, 212–14 role of, 88–89 Madan, T. N., 29–30, 46 magnesium, 200–202 Maliharis, 56–57 manure compost used as, 88–91 nutrient content of, 94–96 maps of Dal and Nageen Lakes, 14 of Dal Lake, painted, 64 of Kashmir regions, 12 of mohallahs, 82 nineteenth and twentieth century combined, 76 map shawl, 74 market gardeners. See floating gardens; lotus gardens; production and cultivation; productivity/yield; raised fields marriages hierarchies in relation to, 49–52 among houseboat owners, 172–75 kinship diagram of houseboat owner, 174 marshy region. See wetlands mats (wagu), 114 Mattoo, A. M., 39, 56, 68–69, 83, 150 Meuleman, A. F., 195, 227 Mir Behri settlement, 56, 59n26, 243 mismanagement, 259–62 misnomers, 52 mlecchas, 32–33, 41n18 mobile phones, 164–65 mohallahs definition of, 47, 81 distribution of, 81–83 map of, 82 ownership distribution analysis sample, 117–18

316

•

Index

Sunni-Shia divide regarding, 47 Mohan, K., 30, 40n11 Moorcroft, William, 69–71, 72–74, 113–14, 134, 143, 144 Moore, Thomas, 9 mud/silt (rab), 115n8 khashū used to gather, 91, 92 tulche molded from waterweeds and, 98 Muharram procession, 48, 57n11 mulberry tree, 30–31 Muslims. See also Shia; Sunni adoption system, 123–24, 146nn7–8 community classification of, 44–46 regarding degradation, 264–65 family names among, 46–49 inheritance systems, 119–21, 123–24 marriage and hierarchies among, 49–52 Sufi, 34–35, 38 Myriophyllum, 88–89, 95, 115n12, 209 Mῑrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt, 28, 37–38, 39, 42nn39–40, 61, 66, 166 nadir chomb (rod), 105, 106 Nageen Lake chemophysical water properties of, 92–94 luxurious houseboat on, 160 map of, 14 names gotra, 29–31 kram, 29–31, 40n14, 46–47, 58n17 zāt, 40n14, 46–52, 172–75 Naqib, Khurshid Ahmed, 222 nāruṭsh (harpoon), 180 National Environment Engineering Research Institute (NEERI), 223 National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA), 218–19 Nature, 189 NEERI. See National Environment Engineering Research Institute Nehru, S., 240 Nehru Park, 247 NERI. See New England Research Institute

nets cast, 177–78 for dredging, 91, 92 New England Research Institute (NERI), 215n14 NGOs. See nongovernmental organizations Nīlamata Purāṇa, 9 nitrogen/nitrates from chemical fertilizer, 195, 204–5 concentration of, 202–9 increment of, 205 monthly distribution of, 206 from sewage, 192–93, 203 NIUA. See National Institute of Urban Affairs nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), 261–62 nursery, 125 nutrients absorption of, 92, 115n9 content of, 94–96 cycle of, 92–94 interrelation between macrophytes, sedimentation and, 209–11 nitrogen and phosphorus, 192–93, 195, 202–9 red tide caused by, 216n27 nutritional needs, 143–45 Old City, 208 organophosphate pesticides, 209, 215n21 oxygen level, 115n4 pacification, 163, 164 paddle-like tool (liwan), 101 paddy, rice, 21, 25n24 Paṇḍits. See Hindus/Paṇḍits papier-mâché, 170 paradise, 9–13 parandh (long boat), 21, 23 parganas, 63, 78nn9–10 PCB. See Pollution Control Board peddlers, 164–65, 172, 173 pesticides illegal marketing of, 146n10

Index

organophosphate, 209, 215n21 phosphorus/phosphates from chemical fertilizer, 195, 204–5 concentration of, 202–9 increment of, 205 monthly distribution of, 206 from sewage, 192–93, 203 pH values of compost, 95 in water samples, 92–94, 200 physical/morphological dimensions, 13 places Dal Dwellers contested, 233–37 Dal Dwellers space and, 231–33 definitions of, 230–31 houseboat owners contested, 245–46 making of, 250–57 pōkurs (cones), 98–100 pollution fish population decline from, 181 Islam and, 264–65 from pesticides, 146n10, 209, 215n21 from sewage, 96, 190–93, 203, 208, 212–14, 246 STPs for addressing, 221–27, 265–66nn3–5 waste management system, 198–99, 208 Pollution Control Board (PCB), 224, 226, 227, 265n4 polythene ban, 214n9, 266n6, 267n18 population growth, 190–93, 214n1 potassium, 200–202 poverty, 183–84 precipitation data, 15, 16, 24n10, 108, 109 preparedness definition of disaster, 116n16 water level, 108–10 production and cultivation agricultural year, 124–28 compost for, 88–91, 92, 94–96 floating gardens construction in, 96–103 Kashmir wetlands beginnings in, 60–61 locations for, 83 of lotus gardens, 104–7

•

317

manure for, 88–91, 94–96 raised fields construction in, 83–88 resettlement impacting, 244–45 water level impacts to, 107–10 productivity/yield acreage in relation to, 128 factors influencing, 117 floating gardens estimation of, 134 island arable land and raised fields estimation of, 132–33 lotus gardens estimation of, 134–36 remote sensing data and acreage, 129–32 profit, 136–39 public trust, 218 rab. See mud/silt rāds. See floating gardens raised fields characteristics of, 68 construction of, 83–88 dendrochronology and age of, 88 floating gardens for creating, 86 increase in, 102, 103 islands formed from old, 86–87 Landsat image of, 84 manure for, 88–91 map shawl showing, 74 in nineteenth and twentieth centuries, 75–77 origins of, 61–66 terminological confusions about, 67–68 types of, 83, 85 yield estimation from, 132–33 yield estimation from floating gardens near, 134 Rājataraṅgiṇῑ (Kalhaṇa) on emergence of land, 18–19 on Islamic influence, 32–33 Rakh-i-Arath colony, 237–44 Rao, Aparna, 1 Rashid, D. A., 196, 223–24 red tide, 216n27 reeds for animal feed, 111, 112 ownership concerning, 117

318

•

Index

rehabilitation. See resettlement remote sensing data, 129–32 research inspiration, 1–3 summary, 3–5 resettlement APC/ODA on, 235–36, 237 delays, 240, 242–43 disapproval and distrust of, 237, 238, 240 of fishers, 184–85 housing conditions, 241–42 planning, 234–37 plots allotted per month for, 243–44 at Rakh-i-Arath, 237–44 vegetable production and, 244–45 rice paddy, 21, 25n24 ridge gourd, 127 riparian zone, 127 Rishi (Ṛṣi), 34 Rishi movement, 42n30 risks houseboat tourism, 161–64 water level, 107–8 River Systems Institute (RSI), 2 Salvinia emergence of, 211–12 nutrients absorbed by, 92, 115n9 Save the Lake Projects. See degradation countermeasures SBRs. See sequential batch reactors Schizothorax (snow trout), 4, 181–82, 183, 185 Schlagintweit-Sakünlünski, H., 71 sedimentation degradation from, 193–95 interrelation between macrophytes, nutrients and, 209–11 sequential batch reactors (SBRs), 224, 266n5 settlements. See also mohallahs; resettlement fishers traditional, 178 Mir Behri, 56, 59n26, 243 sewage degradation from, 96, 190–93, 208

from houseboats, 192–93, 246 interrelation between silting, macrophytes, encroachment and, 212–14 nitrogen and phosphorus from, 192–93, 203 sewage treatment plants (STPs) concerns and problems with, 222–27 FABs for, 222, 223, 224, 226, 265n3 images of, 225 J & K on, 222–23, 226 PCB on, 224, 226, 227, 265n4 plans for, 221–22 SBRs for, 224, 266n5 Shafai law, 47 Sharma, J., 144 shawls and carpets, 168–70, 176nn11–12 Shia Dal Lake as refuge for, 65–66 divide among, 47–48 divide between Sunni and, 47, 50, 167 minority, fate of, 36–39 Muharram procession, 48, 57n11 Shafai law followed by, 47 shikaras (water taxies), 1, 21 Sikhs community classification of, 44–45 inheritance systems, 121–23 silt basin, 194, 197 silting degradation from, 193–95 interrelation between sewage, macrophytes, encroachment and, 212–14 Singh, N. K., 31 Singh, Pratab, 123–24, 146n7 Slaje, Walter, 60–61 smallpox epidemics, 11, 157 snow trout (Schizothorax), 4, 181–82, 183, 185 social structure community classification of, 44–46 ethnonym problems regarding, 56–57 family names in, 46–49 Hanjis place in, 54–56 Hanz place in, 52–54

Index

marriage and hierarchies in, 49–52 misnomers, 52 soil artificial, 69 compost worked into, 91 space Dal dwellers place and, 231–33 definitions of, 230–31 Srinagar greengrocers, 140 map of, painted, 64 population growth and expansion, 191 precipitation data, 15, 16, 24n10, 108, 109 temperature data, 15, 16, 24n10 Stein, M. Aurel, 19, 28, 60–61 STPs. See sewage treatment plants Sufis migration of, 34–35 persecution of, 38 summer vegetables monthly availability of, 137 most important, 125–26 Sunni divide between Shia and, 47, 50, 167 Hanafi law followed by, 47 persecution of Shia, 36–39 Swami, Praveen, 219, 259–60 talim, 169–70 Ta’riḫ-i Kashmir (Haidar Mālik Chādūrah), 61, 63, 77n4 Ta’riḫ-i Rašῑdῑ (Mῑrzā Ḥaidar Duġlāt), 28, 37–38, 61, 66, 166 Telbal Nala chemophysical water properties of, 92–94 concentration of electrolytes in, 201–2 conductivity in, 200 discharge from, 107–8, 109 nitrogen and phosphorus concentration in, 204 sedimentation and silting from, 193–94 temperature data, 15, 16, 24n10 Temple, Richard, 170 Ticku, A., 228

•

319

time, 230–31 tourism/tourists. See also houseboat tourism commissions from, 164–65 crafts for, 165–70, 176nn11–12 around Floating Vegetable Market, 139–40, 141 hotels for, 196–99, 251–52 houseboat owners dependency on, 172, 173 jewelry sold to, 167 onset of, 11–13 peddlers selling to, 164–65, 172, 173 picture taking of, 166 trekking tours, 164 Trebeck, G., 143, 144 trekking tours, 164 Trisal, C. L., 145, 194–95, 202 tulche (cones), 98–100 turuṣkas (Türgesh), 32–33, 41n16, 41n19 Valley of Kashmir as paradise on earth, 9–13 waterways in, 20 vegetables all-season, 125–26, 136 carrying capacity, 132–33 dependence on, 143–45 dried, 110–11, 116n18 resettlement and production of, 244–45 summer, 125–26, 137 winter, 126, 140 Viṣṇudharmottara Purāṇa, 9 wagu (mats), 114 Wakefield, W., 55 Wangoo, H., 249 Wani, Ashraf, 196, 259 Wani, R. A., 191–92 waste management system creation of, 198–99 need for, 208 Water Act (1974), 218 water level. See also floods preparedness, 108–10

320

•

Index

regulation of, 78n6 uncertainty and risks with, 107–8 water lilies for animal feed, 111, 112 spread of, 96, 97, 207, 229 yellow, 96, 207, 229 water nuts disappearance and reappearance of, 206–7 harvesting, 112–14 importance of, 113–14, 144 water samples conductivity in, 92–94, 200–201 locations of, 199 nutrients in, 92–94 pH values in, 92–94, 200 water taxies (shikaras), 1, 21 waterways, 18–23 waterweeds Azolla, 92, 115n9, 211–12 Ceratophyllum, 88–89, 95, 115n12, 209 compost made from, 88–91 de-weeding of, 196, 224, 227–30 harvesting, 89–90 Myriophyllum, 88–89, 95, 115n12, 209 nutrient content of, 94–96 Salvinia, 92, 115n9, 211–12 tulche molded from mud and, 98

wetlands, 214n6 cultivation beginnings in, 60–61 destruction of, 195–96, 197 Wilson, William, 10 winter vegetables island fields preparation for, 126 prices of, 140 World Lake Conference, 2 Wular Lake, 66, 113, 144 Yaqoob, Mudasir, 260 Yasin, Irfan, 240, 241 yellow water lilies, 96, 207, 229 yield. See productivity/yield Younghusband, Francis, 77n4, 156 Zain-ul-Abidin, 63, 66, 166 zamῑndārs, 44, 54, 81 zāt names defining, 46–49 regarding hierarchy and marriage, 50–52 regarding houseboat owners and marriage, 172–75 kram names in relation to, 40n14, 46–47 Zutshi, D. P., 62, 67–68, 228, 250