By Muhammad Anas Yasir
The mourning process is not appropriate in South Asia. It does not grieve; it chants, marches, and retaliates. Pakistan and India, two nuclear-armed siblings, have ensnared the region in their bloody embrace for decades. They were conceived in the same womb of colonial trauma and have since become obsessed with one another, more focused on pride than people and more driven by retaliation than vision.
In the middle of this grievance, the most haunting phrase has become a ritual of silence: “collateral damage.” A phrase that puts civilian death in jeopardy of being proud. It turns mothers helpless, children into unthinkable losses, and neighbourhoods into target zones. Spoken with polished ease by spokespersons and military analysts, this term has killed more than bombs — because it kills the truth.
This piece is not written for diplomacy. It is written for grief. It is written to unmask a vocabulary that justifies horror. To give voice to the silenced. To mourn the murdered.
India and Pakistan have fought wars in 1947–1948, 1965, 1971, and 1999. They have conducted numerous covert operations, propaganda wars, terrorist reactions, and border clashes in between. The world was reminded in 2019 by Pulwama and Balakot just how quickly these countries could burn to the ground. However, who can recall the families interred in the frozen graves of Kargil? Does anyone remember the tales of mothers looking for sons following the surrender in Dhaka in 1971? Who mentions the Kashmiris who vanished during the night and were discovered in mass graves as unmarked skeletons? The answer is: no one does — because irony is that people in both countries have very short memories.
Tensions across the Line of Control flared up again in early 2025. Aggressive policies were fuelled by political shifts on both sides. In Kupwara, Neelum, and Rajouri, mortars and artillery became commonplace noises following the attack in Pahalgam and subsequent events of an air dogfight and drones dwindling around. The casualties? Not troops, not fighters, maybe a few of them as well, but families huddled together in winter. As he attempted to carry his wounded son across a checkpoint, a father named Basharat was killed. Fizza, a 7-year-old girl, was playing with a doll in her bedroom when a shell struck her, killing her. These are representative cases, not exceptional ones. By May, there had been numerous civilian deaths, including many children. Yet, when the men in suits stood before the cameras, all they said was: “We regret any collateral loss but reserve the right to respond.” As if grief is a technical error. As if children are miscalculations. Isn’t this utterly shameful?
“Collateral damage” is not a depressing phrase. It’s an erasure term. The American military popularised it during the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. Under drones, it was perfected to dehumanise the bodies. In South Asia today, it is used to sanitise sin and to smile while discussing murder. The phrase “surgical strike” has become a marketing catchphrase in Indian media. As villages burn, a journalist talks about “precision.” While families are being buried, “measured retaliation” is being praised in Pakistani media. Cowardice, or the unwillingness to look into the faces of the deceased, is what lies behind this language.
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A woman named Razia was sitting next to three small graves in the border village of Teetwal: those of her daughter and twin boys. She explained, “They were eating breakfast.” “I was making tea.” Then everything became dark. She received no visits from anyone in Islamabad. Not a single condolence. No camera. Her sorrow wasn’t nationalistic enough to be broadcast on television. A man by the name of Sohan Lal buried his wife and granddaughter in Uri, across the LoC. Their kitchen wall had been torn through by the mortar. He remarked, “I ran home from the fields, but there was no home left.” It was referred to as a “border incident” by the news when it was broadcast. Only a queue. A tick off a timeline. No one displayed the blackened bricks or the man who entered a silent house after kissing three foreheads.
War is a theory in cities. It is commonplace in border villages. Children learn escape routes instead of maths as they grow up. They go to sleep to gunfire rather than lullabies. They draw tanks instead of colouring books. If you ask a 10-year-old in Mendhar or Leepa Valley what they want to do for a living, most of them won’t say pilots or doctors. “Alive,” they say. When kids are taught to be afraid of the sky, there is no freedom.
Previously entrusted with holding the powerful accountable, the media now benefits from their position. Debates on television have become battlefields. Newsrooms are ablaze with demands for vengeance rather than introspection. Unless they are crying in a 10-second clip with background music, civilians are not included in the story. When did war porn turn into journalism? When did we learn to applaud strikes but not mourn at funerals?
On paper, Pakistan and India are both democracies. Democracies weep, however. Democracies are protective. Democracies don’t treat their people like slaves. Across the border is not the true enemy. The system that spends billions on defence while border villages still lack hospitals and widows dig graves with their bare hands is the true enemy. It puts military ego before human life.
This goes beyond merely criticising politics. It is an appeal for truth, empathy, and language that bleeds when people do. We must stop saying “collateral damage.” Shazia was pregnant, we must admit. Fizza was seven years old. We have to mention their names. We need to insist on a new discourse that puts the dead, not the flag, front and centre. Before praising the retaliation, that dehumanises the injured. That means: no more. We will never recover if we do not grieve appropriately. We will lose sight of our humanity if we fail to count every child. Furthermore, we will quickly lose sight of the true meaning of honour if we keep speaking of death with dignity.
