Militants have shot dead five Hindu villagers and security forces have killed three rebels in separate incidents in Kashmir, officials said.
"Militants descended on a village and barged into the houses of the minority community and opened fire. Five people died and four were injured," a police official said today in Jammu, the winter capital of Jammu and Kashmir, India's only Muslim-majority state.
He said security forces had been rushed to the village Balmatkote near Udhampur, 40 miles east of Jammu, after the killings.
In Srinagar, the state's summer capital, a security official said three members of a pro-Pakistan rebel group were killed in a gun battle with Indian troops.
He said two soldiers were also wounded in the armed encounter, which took place in Budgam district west of Srinagar.
The fresh violence comes as tensions between nuclear rivals India and Pakistan have begun to ease after US-led international efforts to pull them back from the brink of a fourth war.
India has accused Pakistan of stoking the rebellion in Kashmir by pushing militants across a ceasefire line dividing the disputed region.
Pakistan denies the charge, saying it provides only moral and diplomatic support to what it calls a struggle for self-determination.