A slogan is inherently a public act. Unlike my private act of resistance, it achieves meaning and power only when it is performed in a public place. A slogan is a way of indicating that the public space which is regulated by the state, will be reconfigured and reimagined as the protestors seek to reclaim control of the space.
Resistance poetry counters this hierarchization of papers by first creating its own papers: papers that reflect local realities, papers that counter and contest official realities.
Who needs a girlfriend when one has a pari for a lover? (dillagi hai PARI say toh KHAREE kya cheez hai). I was engrossed in pleasant dreams of the pari when I became conscious of a slight tingling in my right arm. As I roused myself, I became aware that the baba was raining blows on me with a plastic rod to ward off the pari.
The recent draft bill proposed by the union government to expand the official languages of Jammu and Kashmir is an attempt to reduce and alter the capacity of people to imagine and articulate their own narratives.
Resistance Poetry draws from the same impulse of defiance, and relies on the power of poetry to mobilize people for collective action. By contesting the legitimacy of this imposition, such poetry seeks to reclaim the control of the subjugated over their collective historical memory.
In the afternoon, came the news of scrapping of Article 370. For the first few weeks, the silence was maddening. The radio just kept relaying congratulatory news about people celebrating the abrogation of Article 370.
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