Mohammad Altaf Dar arranges tiny glass vials on a wooden shelf inside his shop at Lal Chowk, a city square in Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir. Each vial contains crimson threads of saffron, worth more than their weight in silver. For three decades, this shop has supplied Srinagar’s households and tourist hotels with the world’s most expensive spice. Now Dar faces an unprecedented predicament. Iran produces more than 90 percent of the world’s saffron in the vast fields of Khorasan. It has long been