[It is not clear what has caused the rise in nightly
artillery firing across the border, which intensified in mid-August and,
according to officials, has killed two Indian civilians and four Pakistani
civilians, and injured dozens more. On Wednesday, there was hope that a
de-escalation had begun. Two rare nights had passed without gunfire, and junior
commanders from both countries met in a first step toward bringing down
tensions.]
By Ellen Barry and Salman Masood
 |
| Muhammad Shadeen at home in grandson died when a mortar round shot from outside the house. Credit Kuni Takahashi for The New York Times |
JORA FARM , India India and Pakistan .
In the mornings, villagers stitch up shrapnel wounds on
the hides of their water buffalo, and climb up to the rooftops to examine
gouges left behind by exploding shells. Desperate for a night’s sleep, some
have descended into concrete-reinforced bunkers that were nearly forgotten
after 2003, when the two
countries agreed to a cease-fire.
It is not clear what has caused the rise in nightly
artillery firing across the border, which intensified in mid-August and,
according to officials, has killed two Indian civilians and four Pakistani
civilians, and injured dozens more. On Wednesday, there was hope that a
de-escalation had begun. Two rare nights had passed without gunfire, and junior
commanders from both countries met in a first step toward bringing down
tensions.
Each side blames the other for shooting first: Indian
officials say Pakistani rangers are launching the attacks to provide cover for
militants hoping to cross into India . Pakistani officials say the Indians are firing without
provocation, perhaps to retaliate for Pakistani successes against Afghan-based
militants who, they claim, are supported by India .
The crisis comes at a moment of shifting policy in each
of the nuclear-armed neighbors. India ’s new prime minister, Narendra Modi, this month abruptlycanceled talks with
Pakistan to protest
its contact with separatists in Indian-administered Kashmir ,
and his national security adviser is a counterterrorism specialist well known
for his hawkish stance. The United States ’ pullout from Afghanistan looms in the months ahead, a shift that some Indian
analysts fear will swing militants’ focus toward India .
Meanwhile, Pakistan ’s prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, has squabbled with
Pakistani military leaders over policy toward India . Mr. Sharif wants to build business ties between the two
countries to stimulate Pakistan ’s ailing economy. But the generals, who have a long
history of wrecking civilian-led peace initiatives, have resisted — a possible
factor, analysts say, in the increased shelling.
Stephen P. Cohen, who last year published a book on the
India-Pakistan conflict, said border exchanges like this one have repeatedly
led the two countries to the brink of conflict, and that it is all but
impossible to trace their origins.
“On one or the other side, a local commander gets a
little nervous and starts firing at what he thinks is someone crossing over,”
he said. “Or, secondly, a local commander could be ambitious. Or, thirdly, you
could have a deliberate policy choice by the government on either side.”
This section of the 1,800-mile
border between India and Pakistan runs through rich farmland, close enough for workers to
look up at the enemy watchtowers from their rice paddies. Civilians here have
become accustomed to small-arms fire, but in recent weeks villages have seen
nighttime attacks with long-range 81-millimeter mortars, some of them striking
in the heart of residential areas.
The chief of India ’s border security force, D. K. Pathak, who made an
impromptu visit to the Jammu region on Tuesday, said the exchanges began with
Pakistani sniper fire in mid-July, making it the most intense and prolonged
stretch since two countries went to war in 1971. This year, he said, “we have
been told very clearly to respond appropriately.”
“Our response,” he said, “will not be less, it will be
equal or more. But not less.”
Asked what had set off the crisis, he said that he
believed Islamic militants were gathering on the Pakistani side, waiting for
the chance to cross into India .
In Pakistan , Brig. Mateen Ahmad Khan, the commander of Chenab
Rangers, dismissed that claim, saying the flat, bare terrain in the area made
it an unfavorable crossing-point for guerrilla fighters, and noting that India has erected a double fence equipped with sound
detectors, and illuminated after dark.
“There is no jungle, no
forest,” he said. “Everyone is looking at everyone. Why haven’t the Indians
killed or captured anyone who is trying to infiltrate? No crosser has been
killed. It is simply because there is nothing like that.” He also disputed Mr.
Pathak’s claim that the episode began with Pakistani sniper fire.
“These are lame excuses,” he
said. “They lie with flat faces.”
On Wednesday, two nights without firing had allowed some
people to relax a little. At a border post on the Pakistani side, an officer of
the Chenab Rangers peered through binoculars toward the Indian position half a
mile away, and spotted a shadow near the pinkish post. He sent out a
subordinate to tell a Pakistani farmer to come in from his rice fields.
“He could come under fire,” he said. “Tell him to have
patience for a few days, until things normalize.”
Settlements on both sides remained largely deserted, and
those who remained behind were eager to show visitors the punctured ceilings and
deeply gouged walls. In Jora Farm, a cattle-herding village about 20 miles
south of the city of Jammu , a patch of soft mud covers the spot where Mohammad
Akram Hussain and his son, Aslam, who was said to be 6, were killed by a
mortar.
Before dawn on Saturday, firing on the village had become
so heavy that Mr. Hussain, 30, and his family worried that their thatched roof
would catch fire, so they crept outside and sat against a wall, thinking it was
safer there. The children climbed into the adults’ laps.
That is how Mr. Hussain and his son were sitting when a
mortar round fell about five feet away, shearing off part of Mr. Hussain’s face
and slicing through his son’s leg and arm, relatives said.
At a funeral gathering this week, elders discussed how to
evacuate the whole settlement — 800 people and 5,000 heads of cattle — a
measure they have not taken since 1999, when the two armies faced off in a
monthlong conflict. Salamuddin, an elder who uses one name, said the attacks
this month were of the same scale.
“For us, it is a war,” he said. “What else worse will we
see in a war? Two members of our family have been killed.”
Ellen Barry
reported from Jora Farm, and Salman Masood from Sialkot ,
Pakistan
