Srinagar, June 20 -- In the far south of Kashmir, where roads wind between poplar trees and school bells echo faintly across paddy fields, a college gathered for a farewell.

The man at the center of it, Dr. Ishtiyaq Ahmad Shah, was leaving after years of service. He wasn't retiring, just moving, as government officers often do.

But the moment didn't feel routine. It felt like the end of something fragile and meaningful.

Government Degree College Frisal isn't a place you're likely to read about. It sits silently in the Kulgam district, far from the capitals of power. Its buildings are modest, its needs many.

But for the students who walk there every day, some from villages miles away, it is an anchor. And Dr. Shah, during his tenure, h...