01/19/2026
โ ๏ธ Today is January 19 โ ๏ธ
Thirty-six years ago, on the night of January 19, 1990, Islamist terrorists in Kashmir unleashed a coordinated campaign of terror and hate against the indigenous Hindu minority:
๐ฃ Threatening slogans were broadcast from mosques late into the night
๐ฅ Loudspeakers screamed calls demanding Hindus Leave, Convert to Islam, or Die
๐๏ธ Homes were marked, Hindu women were threatened, and Hindu men were hunted
๐จThe Exodus/Ethnic Cleansing:
In the freezing winter of 1990, nearly the entire Kashmiri Pandit Hindu population (around 400,000 people) fled their ancestral homeland of Kashmir:
๐งโ๐งโ๐งโ๐ง Families left with only the clothes on their backs
๐ก Homes, temples, libraries, and sacred sites were abandoned
๐ฐ Many fled to refugee camps in Jammu and New Delhi, living for years in makeshift tents and overcrowded, squalid conditions
๐ฆ Heatstroke, poverty, disease, death, depression, and despair followed
This was not voluntary โmigrationโ
This was ethnic cleansing
๐ฏ๏ธJanuary 19 is now observed as Holocaust Day or Exodus Day by Kashmiri Pandit Hindus worldwide. It is a day we honor:
โข Those who were murdered
โข Those who died in exile
โข An indigenous culture that was nearly erased from its birthplace
This day reminds us of:
โ The evils of Islamist fundamentalism
โ The silence of the global โhuman rightsโ community
โ Decades of denial, minimization, and political discomfort around naming the inconvenient truth
๐ฅ From a trauma-informed lens, the psychological impact involves:
๐ชซDeep collective and individual trauma
๐งฌ Generational effects including:
โข Complex grief and PTSD
โข Identity fragmentation
โข Cultural mourning
โข A permanent sense of exile with no closure
And yet, Kashmiri Hindus preserved:
โข Their language (Koshur) ๐
โข Their Shaivite Hindu philosophy ๐๏ธ
โข Their love of learning, culture, arts, spirituality, and memory ๐
๐ฐ January 19 reminds us that civilizations can be destroyed not only by violence but by forgetting. And **remembering** is an act of profound courage, defiance, conscience, and love ๐
Xoxo,
Dr. Ambardar