Pilgrimization of the return and re-acculturation of the returnee: A study of homecoming among Kashmiri Pandits

Abstract

Return migration is a complex phenomenon of reassessment of one’s place in a supposedly familiar environment that migrants stand removed from often for extended periods of time. The process possibly runs deeper than the physical act of relocation either facilitated though institutionalized schemes or done at an individual level. Post return ‘re-acculturation’ into the host society and a subsequent ‘reacceptance’ by the host community are imperative for the return to take roots. Through an ethnographic study carried out in Kashmiri Valley, Jammu city and Delhi, I explore the particular case of ‘homecoming’ of (a section of) Kashmiri Pandit migrants who have returned to their ‘homeland’ after a claimed ‘exile’ of thirty plus years, following their conflict induced mass migration from Kashmir Valley in 1989 to 1990.