Rajouri, once a well-known pit-stop in Buddhist journeys and mentioned in ancient texts, is now a district where families shelter behind faith and sandbags.

Schools in Rajouri are closed – not because they were destroyed, but because it is no longer safe for children to sit in classrooms as shelling from across the border turns night into day. Repeated ceasefire violations by Pakistan – which spiked after Operation Sindoor — have hit normal life hard.

The first shells dropped as Rajouri slept. In Irwin Khetar village, families scrambled for cover. Walls cracked open and door caved in.  Survivors speak of a night that felt endless – loud, chaotic, and terrifying.

Balbir Kumar Sharma recounted the moment his maternal uncle’s house took a direct hit. “There were five from the family, Three were injured. A child barely escaped. We also sleep now at our relatives’ place because our home isn’t safe anymore,” he said.

In Rajouri and its neighboring villages – Mukabarkapura, Patrada Panchgrahi – homes are no longer safe zones. They have become bunkers, layered in fear. People keep emergency bags ready. Windows stay shut. Families live in one room, often underground or reinforced, waiting for the shelling to stop.

Devraj Sharma, a farmer, had just a few minutes to flee. “At 1:35 am, the blast hit,” he recalled. “We ran out just five minutes earlier. My children were screaming. My fields – thirty quintals of wheat – all destroyed,” he added.

His house, built by years of hard labour, now has gaping cracks. “It is not just bricks. It was hope. It’s harder to rebuild hope than walls,” he said.

And yet, amid the wreckage, one structure stands untouched – a small temple near Devraj’s home. “Shiv-ji saved us,” he said, pointing to the temple. 

In a land ravaged by gunpowder, faith is what villagers turn to, again and again.

Geeta Sharma, tearful, shared her fear. “We were in our house when the shell hit nearby, my daughter got injured. I can’t sleep at night… that sound won’t leave my ears,” she said.

Crops remain unharvested, fields soaked in days of rain lie empty. What should have been a time of prosperity has turned into a struggle for survival. Families have moved in with relatives, many with nothing but the clothes on their back.

But underlying this bleak and broken landscape, there is resilience.

Rajouri may now live between sandbags and silence, but its people refuse to bow down. And when the guns fall silent, they say, the wheat will stand tall again.