In wake of ceasefire, damaged homes in a Jammu neighbourhood bear witness to human cost of conflict
On Saturday morning, Rajinder Kumar, his wife and two sons were cleaning debris in their small house in Jammu city’s Rehari Colony.
The tensions between India and Pakistan that had begun to rise since the commencement of Operation Sindoor on Wednesday had weighed heavy on Kumar’s mind but he never expected the conflict to come to his own doorstep.
Kumar’s slumber was disrupted by a loud bang inside his house at around 5.35, waking up his family. Within a matter of seconds they were blinded by falling shards of their ceiling, concrete dust and smoke.
“We ran outside as fast as we could,” he said.
Residents of the colony say that there was a loud bang but no explosion or fire. It is unclear whether this was a single explosive, or several that failed to detonate, or whether it was the debris of an intercepted aircraft or shells fired from Pakistan.
Next door to Rajinder Kumar, his brother, Jatinder Kumar, was shaken awake too. “We rushed outside to save our lives,” he said.
His wife had been taken to hospital with injuries, Jatinder Kumar said. A woman named Shweta said her husband also had to be taken to hospital.
Besides the houses of the Kumar brothers that seemed to have borne the brunt of...
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