Photographers in Kashmir remain impartial witnesses of the conflict, but still face troubles

Most Kashmiri photographers work with a local paper to be plugged into the local network, to be invited to government press-cons. The second job, if they are lucky, is with an international, or a national agency. (The starting salary of a press photographer in mainland India, at around Rs 25,000, is usually what the photo editors of the Valley’s best papers are paid.) So the camera is almost a body part. Updating of the ‘scene’ is expected almost by the hour. Their day begins and ends with looking for and clicking trouble. And sometimes that trouble is hard to shake off.