The distant crump of a single artillery round rolls down the narrow valley in the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir.

At Chakothi on the line of control dividing Pakistani and Indian parts of Kashmir, Pakistani soldiers peer out at Indian bunkers just a few hundred metres away on a wooded ridgeline which stretches high into the sky.

This section of the frontline was relatively quiet on a recent visit, but every day Indian and Pakistani troops trade artillery or mortar fire somewhere along their long border.

Behind the frontlines, civilians are already bearing the brunt as the two armies engage in a deadly game of posturing and shadow boxing.

Pakistani sergeant Mohammed Yaqub says he "definitely" wants to fight the Indians, until an officer butts in and says "if he is provoked, he has the capability to defend himself", keen insist that Pakistan will not attack first.

"We think the Indians are nothing in comparison with us," says another man, junior commissioned officer (JCO) Mohammed Shakir, sounding like soldiers all over the world. "We are Muslims and we are ready to fight, but I do not think the Indians have the courage."

Pakistan says Indian shelling has risen dramatically in recent weeks, in apparent revenge for a May 14 attack on an Indian army camp in Kashmir which left more than 30 people dead, mostly women and children.

Locals say the firing often starts when Indians suspect militants are sneaking across the frontline, the slightest noise enough to provoke an exchange of fire.

But Pakistan's army says Indian shelling is increasingly aimed at civilian targets. It says more than 20 civilians have "embraced Shahadat (martyrdom)" since the middle of May and over 70 others have been injured as a result.

Nasreen, 25, had been married for just over two months but she lost her husband when two Indian artillery shells landed last week in the town of Hajira, some eight kilometres behind the line of control.

Sitting glumly beside another woman who lost her 18-year-old son, she is almost too overcome to talk. "When the shell fell, I knew it (he was dead), because it landed right in front of his shop," she said. "He died in the way of Allah, what else can I say?"

Nasreen has been encouraged to talk to journalists by the Pakistani authorities, determined to put their point across in the propaganda war that both sides are waging.