Sujan Dutta, the Strategic Affairs Editor at The Telegraph, Calcutta, emailed ComingAnarchy with some updates about recent unrest in northern India. He says:

I am just back from a trip on the “Line of Control” in Kashmir—the Indian side. I went to investigate and write on ceasefire violations there. A ceasefire along that boundary has been in force since November 2003. But in the last three months there have been more than 30 violations.

Sujan wrote what he saw at the LOC in four articles for The Telegraph. Here are some choice quotes:

From Fine Line of Conflict, no less lethal:

Indian forward posts are being targeted from the Pakistani side with Islamabad maintaining a high degree of deniability. Indian troops are coming under fire from little groups of gunmen near — not in — Pakistani posts who are rarely seen in uniform. It is difficult to identify who the attackers are. Are they soldiers? Are they militants? Are they a mix of regulars and irregulars?

Gunfire rakes between India and Pakistan (not necessarily the Pakistan army) in a narrow sliver of territory between the anti-infiltration fence inside Indian territory and the crooked LoC along which Pakistani and Indian posts are often within handshaking distance.

From Livewire fence, cut under cover of fire:

“We know we were fired at from there. How can we say if it were the militants or the Pakistani rangers,” says F company’s commanding officer assistant commandant Narendra Kumar. “But we heard jihadi slogans.”

From Caught between ceasefire & line of fire:

“Our orders are clear,” says Major General Syed Ata Hasnain, the divisional commander in Baramulla. “We do not want the ceasefire to go up in smoke and we cannot allow militants to breach the Line of Control; we have to keep balancing our tasks.”

The Indian Army is also preparing for what its brass think will be the inevitable blowback of Pakistan’s war against the Taliban.

From When shells shattered silence of bell:

For three months at a time, soldiers of the Indian Army take turns manning Dutta, mud and stone bunkers, with no electricity and lashed by whipping winds. They are always in uniform. The Pakistanis are often more relaxed, slipping into tracksuits and informals, fearing not from India what India fears here from Pakistan.

Notice that Sujan stresses this is not “necessarily” military-on-military clashes. Although he uses the term “war” often in his articles, he does not accuse the Pakistani military of attacking the Indian army. The firing across the line presents a political problem for the Indian Army. Not knowing if the shots are coming from Pakistani military, they are reluctant to call the ceasefire agreement into question. In fact, not knowing the source of the shooting helps to maintain the semblance of peace the ceasefire agreement has given Kashmir these past four years.

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