SRINAGAR: In the spring of 2025, when gunfire tore through the tranquil meadows of Baisaran in Pahalgam, it was not just bullets that cut across the air; it was also the courage of a Kashmiri trader, Nazakat Ahmed Shah, that stood tall amid chaos.
Nearly six months later, the 30-year-old handicraft-seller from South Kashmir’s Pahalgam returned to Chhattisgarh, where he was received as a hero by the very people whose lives he had saved in the April 22 massacre that claimed 26 lives.
When Shah arrived in Chirmiri, a coal-mining town nestled along the Hasdeo River, he was greeted with garlands, bouquets and a burst of applause. For the families who had survived the bloodbath in Pahalgam, led by Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha worker Arvind Agrawal, it was a reunion steeped in emotion and gratitude.
“Some people ask me why I am promoting him so much. They say it will hurt my political career,” Agrawal told Kolkata-based newspaper The Telegraph. “But he saved our lives. How can I ever repay him?”
The families from Chirmiri, including those of Arvind Agrawal, Shivansh Jain, Happy Wadhawan and Kuldeep Sthapak, had left for Kashmir on April 18, hoping for a peaceful vacation amid the valley’s famed spring bloom. On April 22, they reached Baisaran, a hill meadow above Pahalgam, known for pony rides and picnics. It was there, without warning, that gunmen opened fire on the crowd of tourists.
“Owing to some apparent landslide, there was a traffic jam on the road. Tourists had gathered on both sides. All of a sudden, the firing started. Before anyone could realise what was happening, the panicked tourists began running for life,” massacre survivor, Shivansh Jain, told The Indian Express.
Agrawal recalled that he had been a short distance away from his wife, Pooja, and their four-year-old daughter when the attack began. “Everything was peaceful, and I was clicking photos. My four-year-old daughter and wife were a bit far from me when the firing suddenly began,” he told the paper. “My guide, Nazakat, was with them and another couple and their child. When the firing started, Nazakat asked everyone to lie down and hugged my daughter and my friend’s son, saving their lives. He then rushed them to safety before going back to rescue my wife.”
Nazakat, who had been guiding the group through the meadows that day, said the firing began close to the zipline area, barely 20 metres from where they were standing. “At first, we thought they were firecrackers. But when the sounds grew louder, I asked everyone to lie on the ground,” he told The Indian Express. “Then I spotted a gap in the fencing and guided the children through it. We escaped before the terrorists could come near us.”
After ensuring the children were safe, he ran back through the chaos to search for Pooja, who had fled in another direction. “I found her nearly one-and-a-half kilometres away and brought her back in my car. I took them safely to Srinagar,” he said.
For Agrawal, those were the longest moments of his life. “For an hour, I did not know if my family was safe,” he recalled. “It was only in the hospital later that I saw my wife and daughter again. I don’t know what would have happened had Nazakat not been there.”
In the midst of saving lives, Nazakat received a phone call that would forever mark that day with tragedy. His cousin, 30-year-old pony operator Syed Adil Hussain Shah, had been shot dead while trying to stop the militants. “Tourism is our bread and butter,” Nazakat said. “We are unemployed without it, and our children’s education depends on this. The terror attack is like an attack on our hearts.”
Even after learning of his cousin’s death, Nazakat did not leave the tourists’ side for three days. As Agrawal recounted to The Telegraph, “He brought us food, medicines, and clothes. We had left everything in the meadow. He was with us until we boarded the flight and missed his own cousin’s funeral.”
Nazakat later told The Telegraph that his family supported his decision. “I could not be present at Adil’s funeral, but everyone agreed I did the right thing by being with my friends after the tragedy.”
The ties between Nazakat’s family and the people of Chhattisgarh stretch back three decades. Every winter, the Shah family travels from their village near Baisaran to Chirmiri to sell woollens. “Chhattisgarh is like home to us,” Nazakat said upon his return. “We come here for three months every year for business.”
When he arrived this October, his first visit after the massacre, residents turned out in large numbers to honour him. “Around 50 people felicitated him with bouquets and garlands. A friend and I thanked him for saving our lives. He had lunch with our family,” Agrawal told The Indian Express.
In Chirmiri, Nazakat was showered with gratitude and affection. “I have never faced any trouble in Chhattisgarh,” he told The Telegraph. “I have known all these friends since I was a child. What a surprise they have given me!”
In a country where religious tensions often shadow human stories, the friendship between Arvind Agrawal, an RSS member and BJP youth leader, and Nazakat, a Muslim trader from Kashmir, stands as a quiet symbol of shared humanity.
As The Telegraph noted, in the weeks following the Pahalgam massacre, communal violence had erupted in some parts of India, targeting Muslims in retaliation. Yet, in Chirmiri, the only Muslim involved in the tragedy was being honoured as a saviour. “This tragedy has brought us even closer,” Agrawal said. “The hospitality his family showed us is something I had not experienced before. I hope the Chhattisgarh government rewards him. He ran repeatedly through gunfire to save 11 people from Chirmiri.”
For Nazakat, there is no politics in his act, only humanity. “As I had said earlier, the media are like our elder brothers, and we have been coming to Chhattisgarh for years. I felt very happy that we were in touch over the phone after the attack and I feel elated to meet them now,” he told reporters in Raipur.
When asked what he felt on that April day, he said softly, “It was terrifying. There was a lot of crying and screaming. While some tourists managed to escape on their own, I helped take some to safety. I only did what anyone should have done.”
Months on, as Kashmir prepares for another winter of tourists, Nazakat’s story, of courage, loss, and compassion, continues to travel far beyond the meadows of Pahalgam and the streets of Chirmiri. It is the story of a Kashmiri who became the guardian angel of eleven strangers and, in doing so, reminded two distant communities that humanity endures even in the darkest of times.
