Eleven years of conflict in Kashmir have left at least 33,000 orphans bereft of childhood, alienated by a culture of the gun and unmourned by the rest of India. In just a little over a decade, violence has devastated entire families; the disappearence of young men and fear of reprisal by the Indian Security Forces have kept students from schools and colleges; the once beautiful campus of Srinagar University has been occupied for ten years by the Indian army, which has erected crude barracks for the few students who attend.

Crores of rupees meant for education, development and rehabilitation are routinely siphoned off. Hospitals and blood banks do not function but the psychiatric ward is overburdened with cases of trauma.