Seema stepped out of her small, dimly-lit room. The last time her husband had been home was in March, when the couple learned she was pregnant. They had celebrated. And he had promised to return soon.

What came instead was his body. Wrapped in the tricolour, accompanied by soldiers.

Lance Naik Dinesh Kumar Sharma, a 32-year-old soldier from Gulawad village of Haryana’s Palwal, was killed in cross-border shelling in Poonch district on Tuesday. Tensions have continued to escalate between India and Pakistan: there were blackouts in several districts, and drones and missile attacks in some parts of northern and western India. Border areas continue to face heavy shelling.

The last call

It was around 9 pm on Tuesday when Sharma video-called Seema from his post in Poonch to show her the forest around him. He had said he would call again at midnight, but Seema, having taken her pregnancy medication, had fallen asleep. At 4 am on Wednesday, the family received a phone call from the army: Sharma had been........

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