Kashmir

Who controls Kashmir?

No single country controls Kashmir. India controls the most land and most of the people. India holds the Kashmir Valley, Jammu and Ladakh, about 46% of the former princely state. Pakistan holds Azad Kashmir and Gilgit-Baltistan, about 35%. China holds Aksai Chin and the Shaksgam Valley, about 19%. About 70% of Kashmir's people live on the Indian side. India's 2011 census counted 12.5 million in its part. Pakistan's 2017 census counted about 4 million in Azad Kashmir and 1.5 million in Gilgit-Baltistan.

India claims the whole region, including the parts China holds. Pakistan says the Indian-held part is disputed and should be settled under UN resolutions. Pakistan's official map of 2020 labels Indian-held Kashmir "disputed territory" with its final status to be decided under UN resolutions.

Why do India and Pakistan both claim Kashmir?

When Britain left India in 1947, more than 560 princely states had to join India or Pakistan. Kashmir was the largest by area. Its ruler, Maharaja Hari Singh, was Hindu. The 1941 census put the Muslim share at 77%. He wanted independence and put off the choice.

On October 22, 1947, Pashtun tribesmen armed by Pakistan invaded. Hari Singh fled to Jammu and asked India for troops. India required accession first. V.P. Menon, the Indian official who came for his signature, later told a story about those days. In Menon's telling, Hari Singh told his staff that if Menon came back from Delhi, all was well. If not, they should shoot the maharaja in his sleep. Hari Singh signed (India dates it October 26). Indian troops flew into Srinagar on October 27. Pakistan says a Muslim-majority region should have joined Pakistan and that Hari Singh signed under pressure. India says the accession was legal and final.

UN Resolution 47 (April 21, 1948) called for a plebiscite once Pakistan had withdrawn the tribesmen and India had cut its forces to a minimum. The two sides never agreed on how to withdraw their forces, so the vote never took place.

What is the Line of Control?

The Line of Control runs about 740 km from the Chenab river near Akhnoor to a point called NJ9842. The first ceasefire line was fixed in the Karachi Agreement of July 27, 1949. After the 1971 war, the Simla Agreement of July 2, 1972 replaced it with the line where the armies stood at the ceasefire of December 17, 1971, which mostly follows the old one. India and Pakistan agreed not to alter it unilaterally and to refrain from the threat or use of force against it. The Line of Control is not an international border. India fenced about 550 km of it by 2004. The fence, called the Anti-Infiltration Obstacle System, stands back from the line itself.

North of NJ9842 the line was never drawn. On April 13, 1984, India took the Siachen Glacier in Operation Meghdoot. Indian posts sit at up to about 6,000 m. Weather, altitude and avalanches have killed far more Indian and Pakistani soldiers than enemy fire.

Could the Kashmir conflict turn into a nuclear war?

India first tested a nuclear weapon in 1974. India and Pakistan both tested in May 1998. Since then India and Pakistan have faced the Kargil War in 1999, a military standoff from 2001 to 2002, Indian strikes in 2016 (which Pakistan denies took place) and 2019, and four days of fighting in May 2025. Each crisis stopped short of full war.

On April 22, 2025, gunmen killed 26 people at Pahalgam (25 Indians and one Nepali, most of them tourists). India blamed militants based in Pakistan. Pakistan denied a role. On May 7, India struck what it said were nine militant sites in Pakistan and Pakistan-held Kashmir. Pakistan said civilians were hit. Four days of fighting with jets, missiles and drones followed. A ceasefire was announced on May 10.

India's nuclear doctrine is no first use, with an exception for a major biological or chemical attack. Pakistan has made no such promise. India has about 190 nuclear warheads and Pakistan about 170.

What does China have to do with Kashmir?

China holds about a fifth of the former princely state in two pieces. China built its Xinjiang-Tibet road (now G219) across Aksai Chin in the mid-1950s and held most of the area before the 1962 war. The war confirmed China's control. Pakistan ceded the Shaksgam Valley to China in a March 2, 1963 agreement. The agreement calls the transfer provisional until Kashmir is settled. India rejects the 1963 agreement (most recently on January 9, 2026).

China is Pakistan's closest ally. China supplied 80% of Pakistan's arms imports in 2021-25 (SIPRI). The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor runs through Gilgit-Baltistan over the Khunjerab Pass. On June 15, 2020, 20 Indian soldiers and at least 4 Chinese soldiers died in a clash in the Galwan Valley, on the Line of Actual Control, the unmarked line between Indian-held Ladakh and Chinese-held Aksai Chin. Xi Jinping visited India in September 2026 for the first time since 2019. No border deal was announced.