In the early days of spring, before the first buds of almond trees began to bloom, our village would come alive with the sounds of anticipation.

It was the time of Gangul, a cherished tradition that marked the beginning of the farming season in Kashmir. The sharing of walnuts, a symbol of prosperity, and the sweetened rice, a token of sweetness in life, were blessings bestowed upon the next generation. It was a moment when the community came together, bound by a shared purpose and a collective memory of the seasons that shaped our lives. The rhythmic clatter of wooden ploughs. My father, along with other farmers, would lead their bulls to the fields, guiding them with steady hands and seasoned eyes. This symbolized strength and hope. As they broke the ground, elders would gather the children, distributing walnuts and rice mixed with sugar, a simple yet profound gesture that connected us to the land and to each other. The essence of Gongul is beautifully captured in the words of Sheikh Noor-ud-Din Noorani, also known as Sheikh-ul-Alam or locally known as Nundreish, a revered Sufi saint of Kashmir:

“Yus kari gongul, sui kari kraw”
“He who sows, shall be the one to harvest too.” -Sheikh Noor-ud-Din Noorani (Sheikh-ul-Alam)

Sheikh Noorani’s teachings extended beyond spiritual realms; they were deeply rooted in the realities of daily life. In another of his verses, he reflects on the transformation of tools of war into instruments of cultivation:

The sword turned sickle was not just a metaphor for peace, but also a call to dignity through cultivation, and a reminder that creation, not destruction, anchors societies. This profound shift from violence to nurturing, from destruction to creation, mirrors the evolution of Kashmir’s agrarian practices.

Historically, the region’s farming communities endured the burdens of begar (forced labor) under feudal systems, where peasants were compelled to work without compensation. This exploitative system fractured the backbone of the Kashmiri peasantry, leading to widespread discontent and eventual reforms. The transition from such oppressive structures to a more equitable system was marked by significant land reforms.

The Land to Tiller Act aimed to abolish the feudal system, granting ownership rights to the actual cultivators. These reforms were not just legal changes. they represented a reclaiming of dignity and autonomy for the farmers, aligning with the spiritual ethos of Sheikh Noorani’s teachings. But as I stand in the fields today, I see a new kind of dispossession unfolding. In the name of development, prime agricultural land, the backbone of Kashmir’s economy—is being systematically sabotaged and swallowed. Orchards that once stood as symbols of prosperity are being uprooted. They are being removed to make way for highways, railways, industrial parks, and military garrisons. Fertile fields that nourished families for centuries are fenced, demarcated, and reclassified, often without the meaningful consent of those who have lived and labored on them.

Through this blog, I try to capture this collision: the voices of farmers watching their land vanish, the memory of customs like Gongul that rooted us (Kashmiris) in the soil, and the stark reality of how political control often begins with the control of land. To speak of Kashmir’s land is to speak of its people, their identity, and their survival.

At the heart of this inquiry lies a haunting question: “Kus kari Gongul?” — Who will sow? This is no longer just a seasonal invocation of fertility, but a question about the future of Kashmir itself.

Farmers’ Voices: In intimate conversations, farmers recount how their orchards, fields, and meadows are acquired, fenced, or demarcated without their consent. Their testimonies reveal not only economic loss but the emotional rupture of being severed from ancestral soil.

Changing Landscapes: The valley’s physical geography is transforming before our eyes—green orchards replaced by grey highways, wetlands drained for housing colonies, glaciers carved by road-building machines. These visual shifts in the land are not neutral progress; they are evidence of systematic dispossession.

Land Laws (and their violations): The post-2019 legal regime has opened Kashmir’s land to outside ownership, often in direct violation of protections that once safeguarded local farmers. These laws, altered or bypassed, reveal how the machinery of governance itself becomes a tool of displacement.

Surveillance and Restricted Speech: Farmers who resist or raise questions face constant watchfulness—surveys, drones, and census-like exercises that catalog their lives. Freedom to speak, protest, or even publicly mourn the loss of land is tightly restricted, ensuring silence in the face of transformation.

Corporate Expansion: New industrial policies and corporate acquisitions have shifted control of fertile tracts from cultivators to large private players. Agriculture, once a community-driven economy, is being restructured under corporate interests that rarely serve the farmer.

Religious Tourism and Demographic Engineering: Alongside corporate control is the aggressive promotion of Hindu religious tourism projects, often built over fragile ecologies and agricultural spaces. Pilgrimage routes and facilities expand into meadows and forests, turning sacred landscapes into contested zones of identity and control.

Climate Change: Farmers also confront the undeniable signs of climate shifts—cloudbursts, erratic snow, shrinking glaciers, and declining crop yields. These changes exacerbate the precariousness of farming, threatening Kashmir’s agrarian future from within as much as external forces do from without.

Resilient Methodologies: Yet, amid these challenges, resilience endures. Farmers continue to adapt, organize, and resist. Through my work, I engage in workshops on land laws, training in visual evidence collection, and community dialogues aimed at empowering farmers with knowledge and tools to defend their rights. These small acts of resistance—archiving, educating, documenting—are attempts to keep alive the possibility of sowing again.