by Tarun Upadhyay in Jammu

Akhnoor Jammu

RS Pura Samba

Punjab

Himachal Pradesh

casualties — is to couch them in pious platitude , squabbling nations cover the matter in victimhood and reprisals . The villages that cower helplessly on the border in Jammu , receptacles of indiscriminate Pakistani shelling in this season of firefights , are largely left to fend for themselves .

In Banglad village in Samba district , about 50-km from south of Jammu town , a disconsolate Shiv Pal , 13 , is unable to perform the shraddh rituals of his 8-yearold brother , Krishna , who died in the shelling on May 21 . Shiv Pal , too , was injured by the spray of splinters . Lying on a cot in his home , he passively watches his cousin performing the rituals . “ I am not sure when I will attend school ; we can ’ t trust Pakistan ,” he says six days after DGMOs of India and Pakistan agreed to observe 2003 ceasefire agreement on May 29 in ‘ letter and spirit ’. Shiv Pal ’ s words were prophetic — the next day , on June 3 , two BSF personnel were killed and 16 injured in the adjoining Akhnoor sector by Pakistani shelling . Normal life was thrown out of gear — temporary shelters for thousands of displaced people were set up ; in all , 28,000 people in 31

Jammu ’ s border villages grapple with death and ruination as Pakistan hurls across a rain of fire

villages were in the line of fire .

With Pakistan violating the ceasefire at will , panic spread like wildfire along the international border in Jammu . About 40 km south of Akhnoor , at Jeora farm in RS Pura sector — home to around 2,000 Muslim Gujjars — people started moving out early one morning two weeks back after it received its share of

With Pakistan violating the ceasefire , villagers along the border in Jammu panicked . Till June 3 , 20 civilians have died in border firing .

pounding . On May 23 , 200 kullahs ( grass and mud huts ) were burnt down by shellfire , leaving a trail of ashes , bloodstains and injured cattle .

The sole person standing guard over 500 huts in the now-derelict village is 70-yearold Har Din . “ When we heard about two sides agreeing to maintain peace we took it with a pinch of salt . Once shelling started in Akhnoor , people started leaving . Once firing starts in one sector , it spreads all along — a pattern , a curse ,” says Har Din , who lost his five-yr-old grand-daughter to shelling . For Gujjars here , shelling has not only claimed lives , but it has hit at the very source of their livelihood — livestock . Forced to keep their cattle in ‘ safer ’ places without proper feed and water , milk pro-

24 OUTLOOK 18 June 2018