ZALDAGAR 1865

Kashmir’s first labour unrest, more than 150 year ago, was the outcome of accumulation of immense exploitation that Kashmir’s working class was subjected to by despots and their local clients, reports Masood Hussain

- Masood Hussain

W hen Srinagar’s 28 shawlbaufs, the shawl-weavers, drowned in the Keat-e-Koul ditch near Zaldagar on April 29, 1865, it merely did not mark the first recorded labour unrest in history. It was not the first major indicator of the political awakening of Kashmir alone. The massacre marked the beginning of a crisis that, over the years, compromised Kashmir’s principle craft that had reigned European fashion streets and introduced Kashmir to the rest of the world.

The massacre bridged the two odd sides of Cashmere Shawl’s uneven history. Prior to it, the Shawl was in a huge demand and the artisans, coerced by the worst working conditions and exploitation were unwillingly putting in all efforts to keep the export going. After Zaldagar, though improvements started taking place, the Shawl fell from its grace even though sections of the artisans were not so unwilling to work. Gradually, Kashmir started losing the artisan and the market as the famed shawl’s freefall has not stopped in the last 150 years.

Zaldagar was a major milestone in attempting an undoing the web of exploitation that despots innovated, with the help of native bourgeoisie, to make the best of Kashmir’s craftsmanship. There were only two principle sources of Kashmir’s survival – Shali and Shawl; the paddy was the principle peripheral produce and Shawl the only urban outcome. At one point of time, the despots would exact more tax from shawls than from the Shali.