Some Indians puzzled by Western alarm over conflict

Sixteen-year-old Arunima Chatterjee was very excited, but it was Spider-Man grabbing her attention, not the threat of a nuclear attack by Pakistan.

Queuing with friends to see the superhero film at a shopping centre cinema, she was surprised to be asked about the conflict that is making headlines worldwide.

‘‘India-Pakistan tension is not on my mind,’’ she said.

But the West is worried, with many nations urging citizens to leave and doing what they can to try to talk India and Pakistan into backing away from a potentially nuclear war.

But few here said they think war is likely.

The dispute with Pakistan is on the front page of India’s many newspapers, but today’s Hindustan Times had a bigger headline on rising fuel prices, and the Pakistan crisis had to share the rest of its front page with stories about a double murder and the World Cup.

Although many Indians are poor and illiterate, knowing little about nuclear weapons or the Cold War, the educated classes are well aware - but still believe the unthinkable will probably not happen here.

Foreign investors are jittery, however, although the stock market in Bombay has held up reasonably well.

Some Indians are puzzled by the alarm in the West - and not all foreigners are buying the threat of imminent war.

Spaniard Alfredo Martinez Orozco, who studies textile engineering in New Delhi, saw no reason to worry.

‘‘I will stay here,’’ said 25-year-old Orozco, who is from Alicante. ‘‘There is no pressure from my family to return home.’’

And one American missionary said he is staying put in New Delhi.

‘‘I thought about everything,’’ said Frank Januszewski, from New Jersey, who works for the Beth Israel Messianic Centre.

‘‘If one billion people can live in this country, I, too, can stay here.’’