A school booklet from year 1944 published by Church Mission School, Srinagar. Among a lot of interesting things, this one gives the story of inauguration of ‘Rainawari Hockey Ground’ in Srinagar, first ever in Kashmir. All girl excursions to high lakes and mountains organised by Miss Mallinson. Also, the story of “The Sheikh Bagh Preparatory School” started in 1939 by Eric Tyndale-Biscoe for primarily for British and other expat boys. Then a bit about the fact that some of the early school songs were modelled on the refrain style of boatmen of Kashmir.
Cover Illustration by Miss G. Palin of Girl’s School
The free book uploaded this month for SearchKashmir Free Book project is a school report published by Church Missionary Society for year 1926 and titled ‘Lake and River Scouts in Kashmir’. From the work, it seems there were other such reports too that covered other Biscoe lead activities in Kashmir.
There are details of number of people saved by the students from drowning, details about the way girls wing of C.M.S. school was proceeding (with emphasis on the school in Anantnag) and funding details of the institution (not surprisingly a lot of Pandit are there in the list of donors and receptors of . Interestingly, the funding from West was to suffer when the World War 2 started). Then there are some stories that are presented as lessons for others.
The C.M.S. Poor Fund 1926
Some interesting name’s there
First Company of Kashmir Guides
Mallinson Girls
Bride over Kuta Kul Canal
The complete work is now available here at Archive.org
Came across it in rarest of Biscoe books, ’50 years against the Stream’, 1930. [Among other things can be seen the famous flood lights that were donated by Maharaja of Mysore in around 1918. A major milestone for electrification of Kashmir]
Man Mohan Munshi Ji shares Kashmiri Bible from his collection. He say’s, ‘ I studied this particular Bible, ‘Yuhanna sinz injil’ in then C.M.S Headow Memorial High School in late 1940s’
Govind Joo’s house. 2008.
The family moved away in 1970s.
You don’t know the story. Khabr’e Chaey Ne. He didn’t convert.’
‘Umm….Khabr’e Chaey Ne. You don’t know the story. He did convert.’
I was supposed to take my Brahminical rites the next morning, and here I was, late at night, in a Pandit Community Hall in Jammu, listening to my Father and Uncles having an amusing discussion about an odd bit of family history. Did their Grand-Uncle Govind Joo Razdan or Goo’ndh Joo, as they called him, turn Christian or not?
An aunt who was married into the family in late 1970s chipped in. ‘Well, it might be true. When the Razdan’s of Chattabal sent marriage proposal for me, one of my old relatives did ask if it’s not the same Karr’e family.’ Karr’e being the pejorative term in Kashmiri for converts to Christianity.
The complete story I came across recently in ‘Tyndale-Biscoe of Kashmir: An Autobiography’ (1951):
“We were at our holiday hut at Nil Nag, in the month of August 1939, when two of our teachers, Govind Joo Razdan, a widower, Sham Lal and his wife, an old boy, Kashi Nath and his wife, asked me to baptize them. They had for years been vey keen on all kinds of social service, so I knew by their lives, as well by their words, that they were truly fit persons to be received into the Christain Church. On Sunday morning I took them to the lake and baptized them.
We, and they, of course were well aware that when they returned to Srinagar, they would have to suffer persecution from the Brahmins, and they did.
[…]
Not many days passed before we heard that the teachers whom I had baptize, were in danger from their fellow Brahmans.
Govind Razdan was the first to be attacked by hooligans while crossing one of the city bridges. Fortunately for him, one of the policemen near by was an old boy of our school and he rescued him from the angry crowd. A few days later Sham Lal was going from my house to his home in the city, after dark, when he was attacked and so badly hurt that he had to be taken to hospital. The man who was the cause of this attack was a Brahmin policeman. Then came Kashi Nath’s turn. He was employed by a motor omnibus company and was taking a bus full of Brahmans to one of the most holy places in Kashmir named Tula Mula, where goddess is supposed to live in a tank. After landing his party at the holy spot, he was attacked by the worshippers, but fortunately there were Mohammedans at hand who came to his rescue and saved him.”
Samuel Bakkal in Palestine in World War I. From: ‘Tyndale-Biscoe of Kashmir: An Autobiography’ (1951)
When the boy who was born after prayers at the shrine of Nakashbandi went Christian in his youth, all hell broke loose, he was told to mend his ways, imprisoned in his house, married off to an older woman, he was mobbed, beaten-up, but finally rescued by his English benefactors and smuggled out of Kashmir. When Mama went Christian, he took on a new name – Samuel Bakkal.
In years to come, with road to Kashmir still blocked, Samuel Bakkal during World War I joined Y.M.C.A as Secretary and went fighting to France, Palestine and Mesopotamia. Later he even went for the Afghan war. It was only after the end of war that he returned to Kashmir and to his alma mater, Biscoe School. On an invitation by Maharaja of Mysore, he went to that state to start something like Biscoe School there. He went on to be the founder of Myscore Boy Scouts [around 1917]. He then returned to Kashmir as Executive Officer in charge of state granaries, at a fine when Kashmir was almost reeling a man-made famine caused by black-marketing. He did his job honestly. He got married to one Victoria Thornaby and had two girls and a daughter. When he died pneumonia at a young age, nearly two thousand people followed his funeral procession.
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Samuel Bakkal. Died 1927. Aged 33 years. He was 16 when he became a Christian at the school. He returned to Kashmir after 12 years and is buried in Srinagar.
Supplementary List of Inscriptions on Tombs Or Monuments in the Punjab, North-West Frontier Province, Kashmir, Sind, Afghanistan and Baluchistan: Together with War Memorials
New additions to archive. Two rare postcards of ‘The Franciscan Missionaries of Mary on the Missions’ of Baramulla.
First one is from 1926 and in French. Shows a dispensary run by the nuns.
The second one is from London, not dated but probably again 1920s. Shows children praying.
