Dehradun, March 22 -- Tania Saili Bakshi

It was 2 September 1994. At sunset, a jeep with flashing lights did the rounds to announce that we were under curfew. A place that had never seen a lathi-charge had witnessed a police firing. The movement for a separate state had peaked.

Nothing would be the same again.

With all the town's professional politicians gone, I was nominated to a peace committee to help restore normalcy.

'I cannot see any men,' complained the new Station House Officer. 'Just hope they are not planning more trouble.'

He needn't have fretted.

You would have found the boozers all lined up in an orderly queue, patiently awaiting their turn to buy stash near the country liquor kiosk, next to the Roxy Building on Camel's...