Tensions on the Line of Control (LoC) escalated on Thursday after the Pakistani Army fired at several points in Jammu and Kashmir. The Indian Army responded firmly, and there were no casualties, military sources said. The attack comes just two days after a terror strike in Pahalgam that left 26 dead. India has in turn taken robust diplomatic actions — ejecting Pakistani military attaches, suspending the Indus Waters Treaty, and closing down the Attari land transit post — citing cross-border connections to the Pahalgam attack.
The Line of Control is the de facto military line separating administered Jammu & Kashmir (including Ladakh) and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). It was established after the 1972 Simla Agreement between India and Pakistan after the Indo-Pak war of 1971. The LoC is not an internationally accepted border but a ceasefire line mutually accepted by both countries.
The LoC has its roots in the initial India-Pakistan war of 1947-48. Following the deployment of Indian troops to protect Kashmir from Pakistani-supported tribal raiders in October 1947, fighting persisted until a ceasefire brokered by the United Nations in January 1949.
The Karachi Agreement of July 1949 marked the Ceasefire Line (CFL) — the forerunner to the current LoC. It started from Manawar near Akhnoor in Jammu and went north to Keran in the Kupwara district and east towards the glacier area in Ladakh, terminating at point NJ9842. Beyond this, regions were considered inaccessible and were not defined.
After Pakistan’s bloody crackdown in East Pakistan, India joined the war in December 1971, and a 13-day war broke out on both the eastern and western fronts. The war resulted in the establishment of Bangladesh and the capture of 93,000 Pakistani soldiers.
In the west, India moved into Pakistan-held Kashmir, taking control of strategic areas like Turtuk, which had been under Pakistani occupation according to the 1949 CFL.
Later, Prime Ministers Indira Gandhi and Zulfikar Ali Bhutto signed the Simla Agreement on July 2, 1972. The agreement made the ceasefire line the Line of Control (LoC) and pledged both countries to honour the border without changing it unilaterally.
Clause 4 of the Simla Agreement requires both parties to:
1. Respect the LoC without prejudice to their respective positions on the Kashmir question.
2. Desist from unilaterally modifying the LoC by force or other means.
3. Carry out withdrawal of troops within 30 days after the agreement’s enforcement.
The LoC thus remains a boundary by military accord, not an international border, subject to an eventual settlement of the Kashmir dispute.
In a dramatic turn of events, Pakistan’s National Security Committee, led by Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, stated that it may suspend all bilateral agreements with India — including the Simla Agreement — in place. The action, if taken, would challenge the very existence of the LoC, heightening already strained diplomatic and military relations between the two nuclear-powered neighbours.
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