KEERNI, India:The past three decades have not been kind to the residents of Keerni.
\nThis village in the Poonch district of held Kashmir sits on the disputed Line of Control between India and Pakistan, and has seen people and cattle maimed or killed in the crossfire or by landmines.
\nResidents of Keerni\u2019s 750 mud-built homes also have had to deal with intensifying border conflict.
\nNow the inhabitants of this village in the foothills of the Himalaya must grapple not just with heightened security threats but with a state-wide drought that is hitting them especially hard.
\nExperts say Indian occupied Kashmir is reeling under the longest dry spell in a decade. Winter crops which would usually be sown by October or November cannot be cultivated this season in many areas of the state reliant on rainfall.
\nSonam Lotus, director of the state\u2019s Meteorology Department, told the local press in early December that held Kashmir had been dealing with a dry spell since 2007 and it was unlikely to break anytime soon.
\nIsolated border villages such as Keerni, which lacks road connections, piped water, a school or a hospital, are among those worst affected by the drought.
\n\u201cSince our area has not received any rains until now, our farms remain unploughed. We\u2019ll have to purchase food and fodder in the days to come,\u201d said farmer Mohammad Fakir.
\nFakir said two factors are making it increasingly difficult to stay in the village.
\n\u201cFarming is our only source of livelihood and rains have become highly unpredictable. Second, the frequent ceasefire violations keep disrupting routine life, and no one feels safe here,\u201d he said.
\n\u201cIn the wake of ongoing skirmishes, we couldn\u2019t harvest crops in time. Due to the delay, wild animals damaged a lot of our standing crop,\u201d he said.
\nFakir said that he harvested 250 kg of maize and 30 kg of pulses from his half-hectare (1.25 acre) plot last season, only one-third of what he had anticipated.
\nIn the past, water shortages were not an issue, he said.
\n\u201cThe village would get 2-3 feet snow every winter about three decades ago, and there used to be no drinking water scarcity all through the year. But the snowfall has reduced drastically over the past few years. Now the village sees only a few inches of snow annually,\u201d he said.
\nWith no electric-powered flour mill in the village, the single water-powered mill has been struggling to meet demand as the flow of the stream declines. Villagers fear the mill may shut down due to lack of rain long before the stocks of grain to be milled are exhausted.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
KEERNI, India:The past three decades have not been kind to the residents of Keerni. This village in the Poonch district of held Kashmir sits on the disputed Line of Control between India and Pakistan, and has seen people and cattle maimed or killed in the crossfire or by landmines. Residents of Keerni\u2019s 750 mud-built homes […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-10069","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-world"},"yoast_head":"\n