Kashmir Keeps Homes Clean, But Poisons Its Rivers |
By early morning, the floors of a Kashmiri home have usually been swept clean. The idea is taught early: “An-nazafatu minal-iman”, cleanliness is half of faith.
Parents repeat it to their children, schools put it on walls, and families follow it in their daily routines.
But step past that same doorstep and the picture changes completely.
The Jhelum carries a visible skin of plastic. Mountain springs that once ran clear now mix with sewage. Bicycles installed under Srinagar’s Smart City program sit stripped of parts or abandoned in ditches. Advertising boards, put up without permission, block the view of the Zabarwan range. Public walls wear stains of garbage like a second coat of paint.
The contrast between the clean home and the dirty street highlights a simple idea: cleanliness ends at the doorstep.
Local practice has narrowed purity down to taharat, the ritual cleanliness mandatory for prayer. Clothes, body, and the small square of carpet beneath the knees must be spotless before worship.
Once a wrapper or a bottle crosses the doorway into the lane outside, it stops being anyone’s spiritual business.
The riverbank, the forest floor and the public square become places where responsibility seems to stop. A faith that asks........