Kashmir’s tehreek (resistance movement) is not just a struggle for justice, it is also a struggle of memory against forgetting. In a conflict zone, every photograph we make becomes a memory, proof of the state’s impunity. Above all the history of our resistance. Through this archive, I am trying to understand how the victims and their families memorialize the absence of their loved ones to fuel the resistance movement.

The idea behind the form is not based on the materiality of photos but the process of memorialization of these images. I felt the intimacy, the information and the individuality of these acts of violence are better magnified if it takes the form of a book and an installation. These photos are mostly taken from family albums or something that is locked inside a cupboard in the victim’s house.

For many it is a pandora box, they don’t open it regularly but if someone like me, an outsider, wants to talk about their tehreek, they hide their pain to talk about the Injustice because these families believe that they will be heard someday. They are using all the opportunities to let the world know about India’s constitutional occupation.

I envision this form to be intimate and informational. During our visit to one of the victim’s family, we found a Locked box of the victim’s belongings which we didn’t open because the victim’s brother felt it was his “Amanat “, a valuable possession for the possessor. These made me realise that the other families have given their precious memories to me. Thus this work ended up being my Amanat, I want these photographs to be a small part of the greatest possession for Kashmir memory. Our remembrance is our resistance.