FROM Srinagar, the capital of Indian-controlled Kashmir, a bus carrying two dozen passengers will embark this morning on an historic journey to Muzaffarabad, the capital of Pakistani-controlled Kashmir, along a twisting, forested 115-mile (185km) route closed since India’s partition in 1947.

The journey will represent a huge step towards peace between two nuclear-armed neighbours who have fought two wars over the Himalayan state that they both claim. It will reunite families divided for decades. It is also anathema to Islamic militants, who see it undermining their campaign against Indian rule and will stop at nothing to halt it.

They have issued death threats against the passengers and promised to turn the bus into a “coffin”. On Tuesday they bombed the route, wounding at least seven people, and officials defused two large landmines.

Yesterday, in their most daring attack yet, the militants stormed a heavily guarded government complex in Srinagar in which the passengers were being housed for safety until their departure. Two guerrillas hurled grenades and opened fire before attacking the compound in Srinagar’s commercial district. Both militants were killed in a gunfight with security forces, several bystanders were wounded and the building was gutted by fire, destroying original photographs by Henri Cartier- Bresson, who visited Kashmir in the early 20th century.

The 22 passengers survived and India insisted that the journey would proceed, as would a reverse journey by a bus from Muzaffarabad to Srinagar.

“The peace process and the journey of peace will go on,” Manmohan Singh, the Indian Prime Minister, who will wave the bus off from Srinagar, said.

Hundreds of heavily armed Indian troops will escort the vehicle to Chikoti at the Line of Control that divides Kashmir. There the passengers will change to a Pakistani bus for Muzaffarabad. The road through the Jhelum River valley is under round-the-clock surveillance and is heavily patrolled.

Bus services between the two cities were suspended amid the chaos that marked the partition of India and Pakistan after British rule ended in 1947. The reopening of the trans-Kashmir route — once the region’s main highway — marks a symbolic leap forward for the dialogue that Indian and Pakistani leaders began last year in an attempt to resolve all disputes, including that over Kashmir, the only Indian state with a Muslim majority.

Kashmiri militant groups fighting for independence from India have rejected the move as a “publicity gimmick” and a “conspiracy against the freedom struggle”. They have called for a general strike today, but they seem to have little support.

Most Kashmiris welcome a step that will reunite families torn apart by the conflict between India and Pakistan. Fatima Begum, 75, one of the bus passengers, said that she was thrilled at the prospect of greeting a daughter she last saw 24 years ago. “The atmosphere has changed. I thought it would not be possible to see Hafiza again . . . I can’t express my joy,” she said . “I will also see my son-in-law and grandchildren for the first time.”

The attack yesterday was claimed by four groups: al- Nasireen (The Helpers), the Save Kashmir Movement, al-Arifeen (The Pious) and Farzandan-i-Millat (Sons of the Community). The first two are leading militant groups that have been fighting Indian forces in Kashmir since 1989. The other two are little-known.

“Pakistan strongly condemns anyone attacking innocent people,” Khursheed Mehmood Kasuri, the Pakistani Foreign Minister, said. “What is their crime? Their only wish is to meet with their relatives. They are not politicians.”

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