SRINAGAR, Aug 31 (1996): Seven soldiers and one civilian have been killed in two days of fighting between Indian troops and separatist guerrillas in the northern state of Jammu and Kashmir, Indian police said on Saturday. They said the clash began early on Friday in Kalaroosh village in Kashmir's Kupawara district, 110 km (70 miles) north of the state's summer capital of Srinagar. There was no word on rebel casualties. The village, situated in a dense forest amid rugged hills, is a stronghold of the pro-Pakistan...

NEW DELHI, Aug 31 (1996): Home Minister Indrajit Gupta on Saturday accused Pakistan of pushing Islamic mercenaries into Kashmir to foil elections in the Himalayan state next month. Gupta told a meeting of his Communist Party of India (CPI) activists in Calcutta that Pakistan would send "more mercenaries" into Kashmir ahead of the first round of balloting on September 7. But he asserted that the staggered month-long elections to pick a local government in Kashmir, where a bloody Moslem separatist campaign has left more...

NEW DELHI, Aug 30 (1996): The number of Hindu pilgrims killed in ferocious weather during an annual trek to a holy cave in the Himalayas has risen to 226, officials said on Friday. Police and paramilitary troops continued searching the rugged and mountainous terrain for more pilgrims on Friday, but officials said they doubted they would find more bodies. Last week, strong winds, heavy rain and snowfall lashed a 48 km (30-mile) pilgrimage route to the 3,880-metre (12,725 feet) high holy Amarnath cave, stranding almost...

SRINAGAR, Aug 29 (1996): Four Moslem leaders quit Indian Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda's Janata Dal (People's Party) in Kashmir on Thursday, dealing it a severe blow in the troubled state. Abdul Qayum, Peer Giyasudin, Ghulam Bhawan and Abdul Gani Nimthihali announced their resignations at a news conference and said they had joined the National Conference, Kashmir's main pro-India party. Qayum, who was president of the Dal's Kashmir chapter, said the politicians were quitting the centrist party as it was gradually...

PAHALGAM, Aug 27 (1996): Weary Hindus packed into hundreds of buses left a Himalayan town on Tuesday and headed home from a grim pilgrimage on which 128 people died. But thousands lay exhausted in tents in meadows around Pahalgam, the base-camp for an arduous trek to a holy cave 3,880 metres (12,725 feet) high. Authorities in India's Jammu and Kashmir state said 128 pilgrims making the trek to the Amarnath cave died in freezing cold that followed ferocious rains and snow last week. Other sources including the Press...

SRINAGAR, Aug 26 (1996): Some 65,000 dishevelled Hindu pilgrims huddled under tents in a sunlit valley in India's Jammu and Kashmir state on Monday after snow and heavy rain had marooned them in the Himalayas for four days. Officials in Srinagar, the state's summer capital, said at least 121 people had died of exposure at heights of up to 3,700 metres (12,140 feet). The Press Trust of India and other sources put the death toll as high as 160. Some 112,000 Hindus had arrived in Kashmir for this year's pilgrimage to...

SRINAGAR, Aug 26 (1996): Around 650 Hindu pilgrims refused to be evacuated from snow-bound peaks in Kashmir Monday as fears of further casualties subsided after a disastrous trek to a holy site cost 160 lives. Some 8,000 people had to be rescued from the area, 100 kilometres (61 miles) northeast of here, during the weekend after snow blizzards and lashing rain turned it into a death trap. But on Monday the remaining stragglers, determined to complete the annual pilgrimage to a holy cave, refused to be air-lifted out...

SRINAGAR, Aug 25 (1996):Army helicopters plucked some 2,000 Hindu pilgrims stranded by icy rain and snow on Sunday from a rugged Himalayan trail where at least 121 have died, officials said. For the first time in four days the weather improved, allowing helicopters to reach pilgrims who included "sadhus", Hindu holy men who made the trek in Jammu and Kashmir state naked, their bodies smeared with ash. Up to 70,000 pilgrims, caught by a sudden onset of bad weather, were stranded for a fourth day at heights of up to...

SRINIGAR, Aug 25 (1996): Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda called for an all-out effort to rescue thousands of Hindus still trapped in the Himalayas as the death toll from a pilgrimage decimated by blizzards reached 160, news agencies said Sunday. Deve Gowda, quoted by the United News of India (UNI), said the relief operation in Kashmir should be put on a war footing. The Press Trust of India (PTI) said the victim toll had risen to 160. The number of people still stranded in the mountains remained confused, some reports...

SRINAGAR, Aug 25 (1996): The death toll in Kashmir rose to 138 Sunday after blizzards decimated a Hindu pilgrimage in the Himalayas, officials said. Around 60,000 people including two women from Belgium and the Netherlands, reached safety following a massive land-and-air rescue operation. Further reports, however, suggested as many as 7,000 people could still stranded in the danger area. Indian soldiers found 15 more bodies on the Himalayan peaks of Seshnag and Mahagunas, 3,380 meters (11,154 feet) above sea level...