The original Gorkhaland agitation took place in the mid-80s, some 38 years have passed. So before I get deep into Anirban Bhattacharyya’s The Hills Are Burning, it is important to highlight one incident that happened in the month of March in 2008.
Darjeeling came alive with fresh demands for a separate state within India for the Gorkha people, with protests threatening the area’s renowned tea and tourism industries. And it happened during Indian Idol that triggered tensions in the hills, almost two decades after the end of an insurgency among ethnic Nepalis that left over 1,200 people dead. During the first Gorkhaland agitation, India nearly lost Darjeeling as a brand in the eastern Himalaya.
It all started after ethnic Nepal or Gorkha policeman Prashant Tawang, the winner of the show, stoked Gorkha pride and raised his demand for Gorkhaland, a separate state to be carved out of West Bengal they have been demanding for many decades. I was told that people in the hills raised huge sums of money to finance a mass SMS campaign for Tawang so that he wins the first prize.
And when a Delhi FM radio DJ mocked Tawang as a “chowkidar” or caretaker, a common term of abuse for people from India’s northeast, the fire was well and truly lit.
Instantly, Tawang turned into the new king of the hills, triggering a political upsurge in Darjeeling. The green, white and yellow flags of Gorkha People’s Liberation Front carried images of the sun, Himalayan mountains and two crossed kukris, the heavy, curved knife used by the famously fierce Gorkha soldiers who fought with both British and Indian armies. The flags started flying from homes, shops and cars all around Darjeeling and nearby towns, bunting criss-crosses above the main streets.
As Bhattacharyya writes in the book, ethnic slogans filled the air: Lapchey, Bhotey, Nepali…Hami Sabai Gorkhali (Lepchas, Bhutias, Nepali, we are all Gorkhas.) And then, many screamed: Jyan dinchau, Praan dinchau…Gorkhaland hami linchau hai linchau (We will sacrifice life and soul…but we will claim Gorkhaland for sure)
Everyone in the hills wanted their self-determination within the Indian constitution, no one wanted to repeat the violence that had hit the hills in the mid-80s. Everyone wanted to protest in a democratic and peaceful manner. The protesters said they – the Gorkhas – were still neglected, pointing to the appalling state of roads, water and public services in the hills.
But will the Gorkhaland state happen? The area lies on or close to the borders of China, Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh, making it geo-politically very important. Anirban Bhattacharyya’s The Hills Are Burning, does not get into that argument but says prestige for the people of the hills is of paramount importance. I saw a video where Bhattacharyya spoke about the book at a literary festival where he said the book belongs to the time when he was in a school in Kalimpong and the hills were actually burning. The Gorkhaland movement was a campaign to create a separate state of India in the Gorkhaland region of West Bengal for the Nepali speaking Indians. The idea was to include the hill regions of Darjeeling district, Kalimpong district, and Dooars regions that include Jalpaiguri, Alipurduar and parts of Cooch Behar districts. The idea was to have an area of over 7500 square km, bigger than Goa and Sikkim.
Bhattacharyya was emotional when he narrated the days of violence in the hills, he was a simple, school student. He recounted the death of person who was shot dead by soldiers of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) right in front of the eyes of his daughter. And then the mother-daughter duo went to courts, only to be denied justice. And then Bhattacharyya choked up, remembering another incident of a school kid shot by the CRPF soldiers because they thought she was a militant. “When the body was brought, she was still wearing her uniform, she was carrying her bag,” Bhattacharya said.
Read this one: “A never-ending sea of people flowed down Rishi Road in Kalimpong, past the Dambar Chowk. Hundreds, maybe thousands, Tukai estimated. There was a crackle of electricity in the air. Tukai stood at the entrance of Gompu’s Restaurant, hypnotised, watching this sea advance, wave after wave, holding placards, banners, chanting with their proud, loud voices.
“Bang! Bang!! Bang-Bang!!
“The sounds of gunfire rent the air, above the din of the chants. Tukai gasped as he suddenly saw people being lifted off the ground with wide gaping holes in their chests. There were screams, pandemonium, rushing feet. More bullets whizzed by, followed by soft thuds as they made contact with the intended targets. Blood spurted out in tiny flower-like shapes.”
And then he writes: “What was aimed to be a peaceful mass protest had suddenly turned violent. Seeing the casualties, the men in the crowd could not resist any longer. They unleashed their kukris and brandished them in the air. They had had enough of being peace-loving protestors and fodder for the CRPF. With a blood-curdling scream of “Jai Gorkha,” a man swung his kukri at a CRPF jawan who was charging at him. The head still wearing the American GI-style helmet was sliced clean, and it rolled down the street and came to a standstill. The eyelids of the jawan fluttered for a moment, like a malfunctioning robot, and so did the eyelids before it shut itself down. The decapitated body, though, ran for a short distance, with its arms swinging wildly and blood gushing like a fountain from the neck, before its knees buckled and the body collapsed.”
The hills were, actually, burning. Brilliantly written, the book highlights stories of Darjeeling my friends Kriti and Swati Bhattacharya narrated in Delhi and Abhaya Subba Weise narrated in a restaurant in Nepal. Darjeeling was their mother; it is still their mother.
So do I start copy-pasting chapters here, in this review. No, I won’t. You need to buy a copy and understand the minds of young students of a school in Kalimpong and how they shared food, and also fell in love and then saw death. The Hills Are Burning is based on true events. It is very emotional; it is very sensitive. I reminded of my visit to Darjeeling in 1987. I met Subhas Ghising, shared his khaini (minced tobacco leaves served with lime), and heard his story.
Bhattacharya’s book reminds me the story has not ended; the demands of the hills not met.
