Ground report: Pak attack mutes Eid celebrations along LoC

As the Muslim festival of Eid-al–Fitr is being celebrated across the world, marking the end of Ramadan, the Muslim calendar’s ninth and holiest month, a tiny village on the Line of Control in north Kashmir’s Uri town is celebrating the festival with modesty and fear. Residents of Silikote, a small hamlet of mud and brick houses, are fearing a repeat of war if the border skirmishes continue. [caption id=“attachment_1022861” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Representational image: Reuters[/caption] Silikote lies a half an hour-long journey from the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad Highway in Uri, along a narrow muddy and slippery road. The village, surrounded by a double row of fencing by the army to thwart any attempt of infiltration, is in a state of continuous fear. The area is being closely monitored by the army, with every move scrutinized after the recent tension on the 740-km long Line of Control (LoC) that divides the state of Jammu and Kashmir between India and Pakistan. A flare-up along the LoC in January, in which two Indian soldiers were killed, brought shaky peace talks to a halt between the two nations. As the tension flares up once again, after the killing of five Indian soldiers, residents now fear that war will break out again. Mukhtar Ahamd Khan, a forty-two year old resident of Silikote, donning a white Kurta silently stares at the barbed wires that are clearly visible from the balcony of his two-storied house. “Peace can never be permanent here, I think there should be full blown war. Doesn’t matter who wins, at least whosoever lives after that, might live comfortably,” he says. “We never thought this Eid would be different and their would be so much uncertainty.” In the main town of Uri people today offered prayers for the restoration of a peaceful environment along the 740-km long Line of Control. “We don’t want to migrate from our houses once again, as we can’t live here during the firing. The ceasefire has to sustain not just for us but also for people from across the line of control.” Kahaleel Joo, a resident of Silikote said. “In case the tension continues to prevail between two armies, the cross-border firing will gain momentum and people living close to the LoC will have to bear the brunt, another resident, Rustam Bhat, told Firstpost. With diplomatic talks on ice and with rising tensions between the two nuclear neighbors, the brunt of a possible firefight in the future may be faced by innocent villagers living alongside the line of control, like Silikote. “We don’t want to see the repetition of that deadly past. Those people who are talking about retaliations and war should come here and live, then only they would come to know what it means.” Sahid Ahmad, 28, a college student of Silikote.