Kashmir's New Money: Pomp, Prejudice, And Social Games

Class differences and social hierarchies are a feature of the human condition. But these get articulated in different expressions and idioms in different contexts. Kashmir is no different.

How, the question, do these differences and hierarchies manifest themselves here?

Teasing out an answer to this question calls for some context and a brief historical delineation.

Historically, Kashmir, to state the obvious has not been a 'wealthy' place. It was defined by poverty.

Going back a few decades or even centuries, land was central to the political economy of Kashmir. The Kashmiri ruling elite, mostly an intermediary class of various regimes that ruled Kashmir, were awarded land grants(jagirs) for their services. The rest of the populace was either the labouring classes or involved at various levels in the production and making of crafts.

This pyramid was empty in the middle. There were no middle classes or hardly any to speak of.

Rushing to the 1947, a watershed year for the entire subcontinent, including Kashmir, land reforms(land to tiller) initiated by Sheikh Abdullah created a new dynamic. Along with a degree of emphasis on education, new classes came into being.

These classes were overlaid by the populist politics of Bakshi Ghulam Muhammad and the attendant socio-economic engineering of Kashmir classes. While his motive was neither aspirational nor neatly meritocratic, but the class dynamic and nature changed.

New classes emerged and given the transition(s) in Kashmir are emerging.

What is the nature of these classes? How do they comport themselves? And what is their aspirational quotient?

The 'quest for capital', no matter the means, appears to be the operative dynamic for most classes. But quest toward what end?

The end is capital, material accoutrements and welfare thereof.

Allied to this is a deep desire for social mobility and conspicuous consumption, limited only by the“evil eye” of covetous and envious neighbours. These are not educated classes in the true sense of the term, merely moneyed ones. The envy they once felt toward the formerly wealthy dissipates, as these new classes now feel smugly equal to them.

MENAFN26092025000215011059ID1110115518