It seems as if it happened yesterday itself, that I went for higher education outside of Jammu and Kashmir.

Like several other Kashmiri Youth, I also traveled to other states of India to get my formal education. 

It all started in Chandigarh and then higher education took me to Lonavala & then Pune.

It seems as if Kashmiri Pandit Youth has this traveling curve common these days and it doesn't seems to slow down.

Although the territories covered may differ, most of us have a trend line that goes deep south to Bangalore, Gujrat, and Maharashtra.

This is obvious because our community has always stressed good education, even at the time of havoc.

Kashmiri Pandits have worked hard worldwide to educate their children and help them stand on their feet. This was important because every single Kashmiri Pandit was left with nothing more than their knowledge and education.

But this circle seems to have no end.

Several families settled in the Jammu region after the exodus, some of them moved out of J&K itself and started settling down in different parts of India as per their avenues.

Still, there is a huge number of people who completed their schooling and graduated from Jammu itself and then went ahead for better opportunities outside J&K.

Some of us got a chance to explore other parts of India and complete our education at colleges that helped us in getting good exposure, which again helped us secure high-paying jobs, but obviously, it was at a cost;

Cost of not returning back to our home town.

It's not that people from Kashmir didn't use to go out and settle outside Kashmir, but with the rate at which Kashmiri Pandit Youth has left their homes, it is evident that Kashmiri Community has still not settled.

Not only the Youth, but their parents have moved on, and started settling in different parts of India, which they can also relate to as the second exodus after 1990.

Although, we may say that we are happily settled now, but looking at the past, it seems that we have lost much more than we have gained. 

A sense of belongingness.

Any person who belongs to a community or someone who leaves his or her home town, think that they will come back and settle at their homes. Even in Kashmir, when people used to work outside, they used to opt for transfers and used to try to get good jobs in their hometowns itself.

But now everything has changed. When the Youth left their homes this time, it was for a long time. 

Some people in our community work hard to meet both ends, and it is not because they are not earning well, but it is because they are not settled.

Someone has rightly said, one of the richest people is someone who can have a home.

But things get messy when there is a sense of belongingness that gets washed away with every single generation that takes birth outside the homeland.

This is because they are not part of an environment, where they don't get exposure to their mother tongue. It has started showing issues with our generation itself, as many of us struggle to speak good Kashmiri.

Although we have some knowledge about our history, and we try to connect ourselves with Kashmir that was taken away, the connection seems to have faded away slowly and steadily.

Is this the end of all sufferings?
Many people may think that this is destined to happen and that we cannot do anything about it, but it becomes our responsibility to save our culture and traditions.

There are several groups of Kashmiri Pandit Community, who have started working on several reconnect meets, where Kashmiri Pandit community members come and connect on a single platform.

Then there are groups of people, who have taken the responsibility for teaching children the Sharda Script, which is our mother tongue as well.

These small efforts are really important, and as long as new generations can relate themselves to Kashmir, even for a few minutes, we have to take it as a mission to help each and every single person connect to their roots.