Srinagar: High in the Pir Panjal mountains, the air is thin, the terrain rugged, and the journey long.

For the nomadic Gujjar and Bakarwal communities, the biennial migration from the lowlands of Rajouri and Poonch to the high pastures of the Kashmir Valley is a way of life—but for pregnant women, it is a perilous ordeal.

Carrying heavy loads, enduring long hours on foot or horseback, often without enough food or water, many go into labour far from the nearest hospital, relying only on family members or elderly midwives. Some survive against the odds; others die quietly along the forested trails, their struggles largely invisible to the world.

24-year-old Rabia, in the final weeks of her pregnancy, felt labour pains halfway through the spring trek. With no clinic in sight and no way to

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