A student from Kashmir doing his PhD in Calcutta, who set off to meet his parents in north Kashmir, has been stuck in Srinagar for the past five days with motor travel suspended because of the India-Pakistan tensions.
Khan Zahid’s elderly parents are holed up in a bunker, built at the back of their home at Tangdhar in Kupwara district, every night to protect themselves against Pakistani shelling.
“They enter the bunker by evening after completing their daily chores,” Zahid, who set out to visit his parents to give them mental strength amid the trauma of Pakistan’s drone attacks and shelling, told The Telegraph over the phone.
“Many others from the village who don’t have bunkers take shelter in my parents’. Some 50-odd people put up there, using torches for visibility,” he said.
“The elderly and the children spend the nights in the bunker listening to the gut-wrenching sounds above. Many of the elderly find it difficult to stand the piercing noise; but they have little choice. Since our village is close to the border, the situation is grim there.”
Zahid’s father built the three-metre-tall bunker in 2019 during an earlier round of tensions.
“On Friday, heavy rain almost flooded the bunker. My mother had to flush the water out. It’s still wet,” he said.
Zahid arrived at Srinagar on May 6 and has been stuck since. It takes a day from Srinagar to reach his village, 200km away, in the upper reaches.
The local people are Paharis. “They are marginalised people whose condition has worsened during these trying times,” he said.
“Although a cessation of hostilities was announced on Saturday evening, my parents and other villagers spent the night in the bunker.”
There were reports Pakistani drone attacks across Jammu and Kashmir and parts of Rajasthan and Gujarat late on Saturday evening despite the agreement to stop military action.
“Although the intensity of the shelling and drone attacks has subsided to an extent, no one knows when things will turn volatile again,” Zahid said.
The student, doing his doctorate in political science at a state-aided university in Calcutta for the past eight months, had decided to be with his parents in this time of danger because his brothers are away.
One of the brothers works in Dubai. The other, who is in the Territorial Army, has been posted in Madhya Pradesh.
“They (the parents) are not keen on coming down to (safer) places like Srinagar, although many families in our area have done so,” Zahid said.
“They are reluctant to leave their livestock behind with none to look after them. Besides, at their age, it’s not easy for them to travel down the rugged terrain.”
Zahid, who did his master’s from the University of Kashmir, is now staying at a rented accommodation in Srinagar.
“My parents are so scared that they have been urging me not to come. They have shared pictures over WhatsApp to explain the scale of the danger they are facing,” he said.
“They are trying to persuade me to stay back in the relatively safety of Srinagar. But I’m hoping fervently for the immediate resumption of vehicular movement.”
Zahid said it would not be easy for him to return to Calcutta, as his parents want him to, since Srinagar airport has been closed.
“I can’t think of returning to Calcutta, anyway, leaving my parents in this danger. They are elderly people; they need to be supported. But my inability to reach them is tearing me apart,” he said.
“I call them every now and then to give them confidence. I want to see them in person. Having come this far, I don’t want to keep them waiting any more.”