‘It hurts to remember’: Blind since 14, J&K pellet survivor searches for tomorrow
Insha Mushtaq, who was blinded by pellet guns during the 2016 Kashmir unrest, continues to struggle with the public resurfacing of her trauma during political debates. Despite her disability, she is pursuing a degree and hopes for a government job, while expressing a desire to move past her role as a symbol of the conflict.
Why it matters
The story provides a human perspective on the long-term consequences of crowd-control methods and the impact of political discourse on victims.
SEDOW(SHOPIAN): Behind a mesh screen, Insha Mushtaq sits in a mustard headscarf, offering a faint smile. She cannot see the camera or the daylight filtering through her window. She only senses. Ten years after pellets took her eyes during J&K’s 2016 unrest, she still carries scars that have become public property, resurfacing every time India debates crowd control.She wishes they wouldn’t. “I don’t want to remember. It doesn’t help and it hurts,” said the 24-year-old, seated inside her home in Sedow village of Shopian, about 75km south of Srinagar.Yet memory has a stubborn half-life. Images of 14-year-old Insha, her face wrapped in bandages after being struck by pellets during protests following Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani’s killing, travelled across TV screens and social media in 2016. They turned her into perhaps J&K’s most recognisable face of pellet gun wounds.
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