The recent Iftar gathering, where Iltija Mufti and the sons of Omar Abdullah sat together in harmony, has torn the carefully crafted masks off Kashmir’s dynastic politics. Once again, the people of the Valley are left staring at a bitter truth: the elite fight no real battles amongst themselves. They only manufacture divisions for the public to consume, act upon, and suffer from.
For decades, Kashmir’s political landscape has been dominated by the two royal houses of the Valley: Abdullahs and the Muftis. Publicly, they perform animosity, fuel rivalries, and claim ideological distance. Privately, their ties are cordial, familial, and even affectionate. What took place during that Iftar was not just a reunion over food – it was a public unveiling of a private understanding. And that understanding is simple: power belongs to the few; emotions are left to the masses.
While the sons of Omar and the daughter of Mehbooba break bread and laugh together, their followers outside the gilded walls of political privilege hurl abuses at each other, carry the burden of polarised identities, and suffer the consequences of divisive rhetoric. The elite are playing chess; the people are the pawns.
Ask yourself: how many times have you turned against your neighbour, friend, or relative because they supported a different political party? How many relationships have been fractured by affiliations with PDP or NC? How many Kashmiri youth have been jailed, injured, or radicalised while these dynasties continued to dine together behind closed doors?
This is not an isolated incident. This is the norm, dressed in designer clothes, sipping kahwa in sanitized lounges, while the ordinary Kashmiri trudges through checkpoints, unemployment lines, and broken promises. The dynasts of Kashmir have more in common with each other than with you.
They all send their children abroad to study in peace while local children are left to face the bullets of conflict. They all vacation in the same cities, marry within each other’s social circles, and keep their assets safe, while the common voter is fed slogans and sedition. When the curfew hits, it’s your street that gets locked down, not theirs.
Let us remember that these same political families have ruled Jammu and Kashmir for nearly 70 years. They have been part of every failure – whether it is corruption, the erosion of autonomy, the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits, or the economic downfall. Yet, they continue to promise redemption and paint themselves as the saviours of the people. How many times will you allow the same families to burn your house and then sell you the water to douse the flames?
The Iftar image is a revelation, a breaking of illusion. But only if we are willing to see it for what it is. If you still believe their animosity is real, you are choosing to be deluded. If you still defend their legacy, you are complicit in your own disempowerment.
The time has come for Kashmiris to stop being emotional foot soldiers in a political war that exists only on camera and never in the drawing rooms of power. The Iftar image is a bitter pill, but it is also a necessary medicine. It should awaken our collective consciousness.
Stop fighting for them. Start thinking for yourself.
When politicians switch sides, form sudden alliances, or hug on Eid after months of hatred on TV, they are showing you the game. It is not real. It never was. It is a performance. A theatre. And you have been made the unpaid actor in their production.
This Iftar must mark a turning point in how we, as Kashmiris, understand our politics. We need to divorce ourselves from blind loyalty to dynasties. We must develop a political culture rooted in policy, principles, and performance – not personalities.
Let us hold every politician accountable, regardless of their surname. Let us vote with our minds, not our bloodlines. Let us reject the politics of inherited entitlement and demand leaders who rise from the grassroots, who know hunger, who know grief, who understand the street, not just the studio.
And above all, let us stop hating each other because they tell us to. Let us stop vilifying the other party’s voter. We are not each other’s enemies. The real betrayal is happening over shared meals and private agreements.
You deserve better. We all do.
The Bitter Truth is this: until Kashmiris unite across party lines, until we break the spell of dynastic emotional manipulation, we will continue to live in cycles of betrayal.
They will dine. We will divide. They will win. We will weep.
Unless we change the script.
This Eid, take your Iftar with family, not fury. Break bread with someone who thinks differently. Celebrate rationality. Choose wisdom. The time for awakening is not tomorrow.
It is now.
