Whispers Of Wullar: Tales Of Heartbreak And Hope In Kashmir

By Rayees Ahmad Kumar

Every year, the Wullar Urdu Adbi Forum Kashmir summons writers to tell their stories.

Founders have turned storytelling into ritual. They host, critique, and champion Urdu fiction with the rigour of scholars and the care of friends.

During the pandemic, when the world fell silent, the forum's gatherings moved online. Words travelled through screens, binding writers across oceans.

Afsanvi Sadaein, edited by Dr. Shaheena Yusuf, is the record of one such gathering.

Thirty-one stories, each a pulse of a society in flux, now rest on paper.

The anthology begins with Noor Shah's Wapsi, set on Dal Lake. A community that shares faith fractures into islands of practice, mosques proliferate, and tradition bends under modern pressures. The story reminds readers that division often hides in the familiar.

Dr. Mushtaq Ahmad Wani's Aaw Ab Nikah Kar Lein explores intimacy in the digital age. Two strangers meet over WhatsApp, meet in parks, and find desire and disillusionment entwined. Sadai Saher discovers that love online cannot shelter against truth. Youth, unmoored from guidance, stumble into lessons learned too late.

Dr. Riyaz Tawheedi's Phool aur Khushboo moves differently. It whispers rather than strikes, mapping devotion and spiritual longing. Meditation, guidance, and love for the divine pull the reader inward, toward reflection.

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