BULLETS SLAY the flesh. Thoughts can erase a race. Sure, there were bullets as the 1990s began with the separatist Kashmir movement. But there were even more of the normal things, stuff that is not often associated with menace. There were whispers, posters, slogans and loudspeakers. “Hum kya chahte? Azaadi, azaadi (What do we want? Freedom, freedom).” “Sarhad paar jaayenge, Kalashnikov laayenge (We’ll cross the border, get the Kalashnikov).” And the appalling “Batao roas te Batanev san, iss banao Pakistan (Without the Pandit, with his wife; we’ll make Pakistan).”
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