Memory began its whisper on the flight to Srinagar. Two non-resident Kashmiris, in their 30s, were seated next to me. Isn’t the high turnout in the Assembly elections in Kashmir a sign of normalcy returning to it, I asked them. “Normalcy!” scoffed the man who is now a resident of Canada. Last year, during a short stay in the Valley, the security forces handpicked him and two others to enter houses to check whether there were gunmen hiding in them. “They wanted me to be their human shield in the search operation. I refused,” he said. Refused? “I made it a point to tell them that I am a Canadian resident.”

The other Kashmiri, who works with a media outlet in Dubai, too had a story to narrate: In the spring of 2002, when he was in high school, the Army announced a search operation in his neighbourhood. All the men were ordered to assemble in an open area, with women and children left behind in their homes. From the assembly of men, the young, including the man from Dubai, were chosen to accompany the soldiers for the search.