Srinagar, Jan 19 (KNO): For 22 months, a river held a secret and a village held its breath. On Monday, the waters finally yielded their last chapter, as Showkat Ahmad Sheikh came home for the last rites.
As per the details collected by the news agency—Kashmir News Observer (KNO), the victim’s body was retrieved from the Jhelum River by a team that included local boys and sand evacuators.
The rescuers describe a moment of unreal grace, saying “IT was like a rose untouched by the storm.”
The villagers gathered around the freshly dug grave, it was clear that the wound of his absence had left a deep scar in every heart.
The funeral procession moved slowly toward the resting place with cries of “Allah Hu-Akhbar and Shaheed Ke Jo Mout Hai, Qoum Ki Hayat Hai.”
In the lanes of Gandbal, two years of grief poured out in open tears, in bowed shoulders, and in the wide, lost eyes of children walking beside the whispering Jhelum.
“The river returned him and now the earth takes him,” whispered an elder during the funeral procession. “For 22 months, we prayed, waited and feared. “The earth makes its claim, but love shouts its defiance.”
Earth met the coffin with trembling hands, while the air held something else entirely, a grief-stricken silence, mingled with relief, as a painful chapter was finally laid to rest.
Villagers held each other, tears rolling freely, while memories of laughter and life lost mingled with the silence of the moment. The air was filled with grief, yet there was also a quiet relief and a painful chapter finally reaching its end.
“Showkat will rest here, in our hearts and in the soil of Gandbal,” said a relative, as tears rolled down her face. “For nearly two years, we lived in hope and despair. Now, we can finally let him go.”
The Gandbal boat tragedy, which claimed eight lives including several schoolchildren, remains one of Srinagar’s deadliest river accidents in recent memory—(KNO)