Journey along the Jhelum

Sridhar K. Chari traverses the historic Jhelum Valley Road from Srinagar to Uroosa, the last village before the Line of Control in the earthquake-devastated Uri sector in the Kashmir Valley, and comes away with a sense of a world teetering on the edge.

AROUND the world, there are great cities, grand bridges, magnificent buildings and superb museums. And then there are great roads.

If you are a road person, a journey down the Srinagar-Muzaffarabad highway in the vale of Kashmir, officially designated NH-1A, is an experience like no other. For long known as the Jhelum valley road, this strip of winding tarmac is more than 100 years old. For decades, it was the only link to the Kashmir valley. Even when other roads began to link Srinagar, it continued to be the only all-season road, by virtue of its low elevation.

Down the years, it has offered passage to tradesmen, marauding tribesmen, military forces, missionaries, United Nations officials, Kashmiris, Paharis, and Pandits. On the first stretch is the 100-km distance from Srinagar to Uri town. You pass through Pattan, still a hotbed of militant activity, Baramulla town, Mohura, the 1000-year-old Datta temple, villages like Lagama and Jabla, before reaching the tehsil headquarters of Uri.

From Baramulla, the Jhelum river joins the road, running alongside till they both meet the LoC. From Uri, the LoC at Kaman Post is 18 km away. The first village on the Pakistani side, Chakothi, is at 20 km. And Muzaffarabad, badly damaged in the 7.4 Richter October 8 quake, is 70 km away. Both the places are listed on the green and white nameboards on the road. They are, after all, supposed to be in India – we show it in our maps of Jammu and Kashmir.

As we hurtled northwards in a Sumo on October 19, dawn was just breaking and it promised to be a good day. We desperately needed clear weather. Our plan was to stop the vehicle at Julla, about 10 km after Uri town, and then proceed on foot. The road after that is blocked by a quake-triggered landslide. The goal was to reach the Kaman bridge, more recently known as Aman Sethu — the peace bridge. This is the route of the Caravan-e-Aman (peace bus).

As dawn breaks, and the blighted land receives the first rays of the sun, I think it might have been on just such a day, in October 1947, that hordes of armed tribesmen in rickety buses, prodded by the newly formed Pakistan, made their invasion along the road, almost reaching Srinagar. Major Somnath Sharma leading D company of 4 Kumaon made his famous last stand, for which he became the first recipient of the Param Vir Chakra.

Before the start of the bus service, the road was open only till Uri town. Even local residents could go only up to the Lalpul, or Red Bridge, which is about six kilometres short of the Kaman post. The last stretch, in poor condition, was out of bounds. Mined heavily, it was dangerous. And before the ceasefire, there were the Pakistani snipers and artillery fire to worry about.

The primary danger that we faced, however, was not from mines or enemy fire or from militants but from the prospect of clambering over slippery landslide rubble on the road. Aftershocks were still coming, and the bigger ones were triggering off fresh landslides. An aftershock around 10 am on the morning of October 16 triggered off a landslide which claimed the life of a woman. The woman, along with army jawans and a sniffer dog, had been looking for the body of her child caught in the first landslide on October 8. An Army jawan, too, was badly injured and it took days for the jawans to recover the woman’s body.

Traversing the landslides, with a cold Jhelum waiting below, was, to put it mildly, very interesting. When your searching foot fails to get an adequate grip, and there is nothing really to hold on to, every step is an eternity. In between mounds of boulders and rubble, we spotted a damaged Sumo, roadwork equipment and even a bus.

We finally approached our first landmark — the Red Bridge. Bemused BSF guards let us through with an entry in their register. The next stop was the Twin or ‘Weak bridge’ and an Indian Army post. And there we were finally stopped in our advance. The woman’s death had occurred after this stretch, and it was fresh in the Army’s minds. Radio conversations followed with "Tiger" perched up in the hill, the last Army post. "10 ke aagey math chodna," came the voice over the air. And that was it.

Our disappointment was quickly mitigated, however, when we learnt that the Uroosa helipad was just above us.

They began building the Uroosa helipad in October last year, when the Jhelum Valley Road was being readied for the bus. It was completed just before the bus started plying in April. It was built by the Indian Army and used by both Army aviation and the Indian Air Force. Post-quake, MI-17 choppers make regular sorties from Uri and Srinagar, while the smaller Cheetah and Chetaks dropped relief in remote villages like Goalta.

A horrific site awaited us as we climbed up to the helipad, which is at one of the lowest points in the valley, lower than even Srinagar. To the west was a huge ridge, beyond which is POK. But its mountain face had been ripped off by the earthquake, taking down with it bunkers manned by the Gorkha Rifles. To the north there were more bunkers, manned by the Dogras. Total dead: 34. Missing: 11.

As we stood there, staring at the power of the earthquake to literally break mountains, Pakistani choppers hovered in the distance, careful to stay within their side. A treeline, marking the LoC, waved gently in the wind. We could see settlements on a PoK hill. Dead on our side:1300. Dead on their side: 53,000. The Line of Control is also the Line of Devastation.

We were not really up to another walk over landslides, and so we hitched a ride back to Uri on a MI-17. As the helicopter lifted off, the Jhelum valley fell away below us, and we could see the road. A tragic road, a road of battles, earthquakes, trade, and also a road of meetings and peace-making. A world teetering on the edge.

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