Language Remembers What the State Wants to Forget: Politics of Urdu in Kashmir

An interesting article in The Wire by Huzaiful Reyaz ” a Kashmiri researcher and independent writer based in New Delhi”

Some excerpts:

Urdu did not arrive in Kashmir as a native tongue, nor was it entirely foreign. Like many things embedded into the region’s administrative fabric, the language came with the empire – first with the Sikhs and then, more decisively, under Dogra rule.

In 1889, Maharaja Pratap Singh, under British pressure, formally replaced Persian with Urdu as the official language of the princely state. It was a pragmatic decision, born less of cultural affinity and more of bureaucratic convenience, as Urdu had already emerged as the lingua franca of northern India.

Still, what began as a top-down imposition gradually grew into a bottom-up acceptance. Urdu spread through courts, government offices and early education institutions. It was taught in primary schools, in Jammu and in Kashmir, even before regional languages like Dogri or Kashmiri were formally introduced.

By the early 20th century, local newspapers, literary journals and political pamphlets were increasingly printed in Urdu. Its script, similar to Persian, was already familiar to both Muslim and Hindu elites. And as political mobilisation gathered pace in the 1930s, leaders like Sheikh Abdullah turned to Urdu poetry and oratory to stir the masses.

Though only a few Kashmiris have ever spoken Urdu as a mother tongue, many made it their political and poetic tongue. Over time, it became a language of aspiration, religious expression and collective belonging. In that sense, Urdu occupied a unique space, an elite language that became locally rooted, a colonial medium-turned-cultural memory.

And:

Kashmir, a place where memory is often the only thing that survives, still needs a language soft enough to carry the weight of what it feels, firm enough to hold its rage. Urdu has long served as that vessel, carrying longing without bitterness, history without footnotes.

As a calligrapher in Anantnag put it simply: “We stopped writing Urdu for officials, but we still write it for God.”

As bureaucracies evolve and syllabi forget, Urdu no longer serves the state, but it serves the soul. In Kashmir, Urdu survives because it is still remembered. Because it knows what power does not record. And perhaps that is its most resilient form yet.

Because some languages do not need permission to exist – only memory, breath and time.