| Agnishekhar | |||||||
| Birth Name: | Kuldeep Sumbly | ||||||
| Birth Date: | 3 May 1956 | ||||||
| Birth Place: | Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir | ||||||
| Years Active: | 1990–present | ||||||
| Movement: | Panun Kashmir | ||||||
| Spouse: | Kshama Kaul | ||||||
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Kuldeep Sumbly (born 3 May 1956), better known by his pen name Agnishekhar,[1] is a Kashmiri Pandit writer and political activist. He is the founder of Panun Kashmir ("Our Kashmir") organization, a group that advocates for the cultural rights of Pandits and a homeland.[2] [3] As a poet, he has contributed to the development of a Hindi poetry of exile from a distinctly Kashmiri perspective.[4] He views pre-Islamic culture as a source for contemporary Pandit identity.[5]
Agnishekhar is the author of Kisi Bhi Samay (At Any Moment), a collection of poetry published in 1992. The book is organized into two sections: the 49 poems of "Kram" ("Sequence"), and the ten poems of "Visthapit Kashmir" ("Displaced Kashmir") which differ from "Kram" in being labeled by place of composition (always Jammu) and a date ranging from mid-1990 to early 1991.[6] The poem "Mahavipada" ("Great Trouble"), from the "Displaced Kashmir" section, criticizes the camps into which displaced Pandits were settled.[7]
Agnishekhar also contributed to the screenplay for the "Bollywood-style" movie Sheen, which uses Pandit displacement as the context of a love story.[8]
Athrot is an organization of displaced artists and writers organized its first ever Kashmiri Poetry day on 27 August 2018 and Agnishekar presided over the poetic session.[9]
Mohammed Ayub Betab's poems in original Kashmiri are translated to Hindi by Agni Shekhar.[10]