NEW DELHI, 2 November — As hundreds of troops started heading back to barracks yesterday from the western border with Pakistan, Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee said that creating an atmosphere of trust was vital to resuming dialogue with Islamabad.

Vajpayee ruled out early talks with arch-rival Pakistan over disputed Kashmir, saying yesterday that creating an atmosphere of trust was vital to resuming dialogue.

“Today, nations of the world are putting pressure that we hold talks (with Pakistan),” Vajpayee told reporters here.

“But we want to say that for holding such discussions, an atmosphere of trust should be created first. You should have faith in the other party. “Intentions should not be doubted...only then can a dialogue succeed and the crisis be resolved,” Vajpayee said during the inauguration of a housing complex for relatives of soldiers killed during a conflict between India and Pakistan between May-July 1999 in Kashmir’s Kargil region.

The militant incursions are at the heart of the latest tensions, which have seen both sides mobilize around one million troops along their shared frontier since December, after an attack on the Parliament was blamed on Pakistan-based rebels.

The nuclear-armed neighbors announced plans in mid-October to withdraw troops from the internationally-recognized stretch of their common boundary following intense international diplomatic pressure.

Defense spokesman Maj. Xavier Thomas, based in Jodhpur city in the desert state of Rajasthan, said some troops had already been pulled back but the process would be stepped up from Nov. 10. “A few units belonging to the main strike core posted on the India-Pakistan border have started returning to their regimental centers,” Thomas said.

“The pull-out constitutes a huge logistical exercise and we have requested the Indian Railways for special trains from the border towns of Bikaner and Jaisailmer to transport soldiers, their luggage and equipment.”

A spokesman for the railways said batches of 100 to 200 soldiers had already begun boarding trains from Jodhpur on a daily basis. “We will only be able to comply with the army’s request for more trains by Nov. 10. There is a major rush right now for train seats as the Diwali holidays are here.”

Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights, is on Nov. 4. India is expected to pull back some 500,000 troops but retain 150,000-200,000 soldiers in its zone of Kashmir. Pakistan’s scaling-down would involve around 300,000 combat personnel.

Vajpayee yesterday recalled a trip he made to Lahore in February 1999, for peace talks with his then Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif, months before the Kargil conflict broke out.

“Peace talks in Lahore and war in Kargil. This was betrayal,” Vajpayee said. “Our neighbor chose a spot (to attack) that was comparatively not very secure.”

Vajpayee’s comments came in the wake of accusations by Foreign Minister Yashwant Sinha that Pakistan is using terrorism as a “pre-dialogue negotiating tactic.” “We will be satisfied only when there is a complete stop to cross-border terrorism,” Sinha told the BBC’s Asia Today program Thursday.

“Until then, there is no conducive atmosphere for talks.”