Kashmir lies in the shadow of nuclear war

Luke Harding, Guardian News Service, Kashmir

The shell came clattering over the mountain just as Mohammed Arif Bhat ventured outside to rescue his sheep. It fell through the cool Himalayan air and crashed into a sloping forest of pine trees, horse chestnut and white blossom.

Mohammed's three sisters heard the explosion -- and then silence. When the bombardment ceased, they went to look for their brother.

The shell had landed 20 feet away from where Mohammed, an 18- year-old student, had been crouching on a stone wall. "We tried to wake him up. But the shrapnel had hit him in the front and back of his head," his sister Shaheena, 22, said. "We loved him very much. He was the only male in our family."

"We have lost our hopes," she added.

Mohammed's death six days ago was random, meaningless and cruel. His village, Pakhlan, is less than three miles from the "line of control", the frontline in Kashmir between Indian and Pakistani forces. The invisible Pakistani gunners on the other side of the densely forested mountain had been trying to hit the Indian army brigade headquarters lower down the valley. They killed Mohammed instead.

But India and Pakistan, now standing on the brink of an all- out war, have over time developed an insouciant attitude towards death. There are now daily artillery battles between Indian and Pakistani forces. Since January, after militants launched an audacious and symbolic attack on India's parliament building, nearly a million men have been dug in on either side of the border.

When relations between India and Pakistan are good -- which is not often -- the shelling stops. When they are bad, it starts again.

But few of Pakhlan's 1,000 villagers understand that the subcontinent is on the verge of a different, more chilling, kind of war, fought not with shells but nuclear-tipped missiles. "We don't k now what is going on. We just know that when the shells start landing things are bad," Shaheena said.

Who did she blame for Mohammed's death? "We don't want to blame anybody."

The line of control divides Pakistan and Indian occupied Kashmir. The border has scarcely changed since January 1949, when Indian and Pakistani troops fought each other to a standstill over the disputed territory and signed a ceasefire.

Driving towards it, it becomes clear that any invasion would be almost impossible. The whole area is hugely militarized. The ruler-straight road from Srinagar, Jammu and Kashmir's summer capital, passes through a valley enclosed by the mountains of Gulmarg, India's only ski resort. The apple orchards and rice fields gradually disappear. The route then rises above the turbulent olive-green Jhelum river and bumps through a landscape of sheer peaks, glinting tin roofs, and shimmering willows. Indian soldiers are everywhere, checking identity papers or standing on patrol under the shade of poplars. Army convoys clatter towards the frontline in a whirl of dust.

Since the latest escalation in hostilities, firing has taken place on a daily basis, sending residents in the border town of Uri jumping into their home-made underground bunkers. "The entire roof of my house was destroyed last week in shelling," Shah Zaman Patman, 40, a civil servant said. "I've had to move out." Who did he blame for the current standoff? "I'm fed up with both India and Pakistan."

Patman and other locals are phlegmatic about the prospect of a full-blown conflict. "The shelling has been going on for a long time. It is already like a war for us," he said. The residents of these Himalayan mountains are not stupid: Most of the time, they point out, the shells miss. The last shelling in Mohammed's village was over a year ago. To reach his house involves a steep 30-minute trek.

The air is fresh and scented with resin. In the near distance is a snow-topped mountain. The mountain belongs to Pakistan. The shells landed in the village between 5.25 a.m and 5.40 a.m. There were 20 of them. "Three of the shells landed in the village itself; the others crashed into the forest on the opposite side," Nazir Ahmed, 30, a shopkeeper, said. "It was brutal."

The Indian authorities have developed a perfunctory attitude towards shelling victims: There are, after all, plenty of them. The local deputy-general of police gave Mohammed's family 100,000 rupees (about 1,500 pounds sterling ) in compensation. After an autopsy, Mohammed's body was returned to the village the day he was killed. His funeral was held at 9pm. Mohammed's sisters, Shaheena, Jabeena, 17, and Nasreena, 12, are wondering what to do next.

"Our parents are dead. Mohammed was the only breadwinner. When he was not studying he also worked as a laborer to get us some money," Shaheena said. "The last thing he said to me was: 'Keep my breakfast for when I come back.' The shells had already started falling and he wanted to bring in our sheep and cattle."

The shell landed on a ziaryat, or holy site, sacred to a Kashmiri saint, Baba Dawood Khaki. Ironically the site, a pile of boulders decorated with red flags, is supposed to offer protection from evil.

Yesterday Mohammed's sisters sat in the sunshine and took his school textbooks out of his fraying satchel. They produced a notebook in which Mohammed had written an essay on communal harmony. "Hindus and Muslims are brothers," he wrote. "They are both human beings and should respect each other." It is a reasonable enough sentiment, but one that faces extinction as India and Pakistan hurtle towards the abyss.