How the India-Pakistan fighting affected children near the border and across the country

Over the past ten days, whenever Mushtaq Ahmed heard explosions or aircrafts from his home in Kashmir, around 100 km from the border with Pakistan, he immediately checked whether his children were watching cartoons on television.

Ahmed’s children are seven and 14 years old. When India and Pakistan began to attack each other on May 7, they grew anxious for their safety and would sometimes go into a panic. “They were so anxious that they began to throw up,” Ahmed said. When they heard the sounds outside, he added, “they got very scared, so I tried to drown out the noise”.

But Ahmed also ensured that the television was not playing a news channel, many of which broadcast shrill misinformation aimed at stoking fear and anger. “Whatever they were showing on TV was very scary,” he said.

The family tries to avoid discussing anything about the conflict inside the house. However, they realised it was impossible to avoid conversations on the subject. During one particularly tense day, Ahmed recounted, “my son asked me what had happened and I just told him that there was nothing to worry”.

He added, “We are in the middle of a conflict zone, so we are kind of used to it but how...