Some crying with joy, two groups of Indian and Pakistani Kashmiris walked over "Peace Bridge" yesterday, breaking through the military line that has divided them and their land with blood for almost 60 years.

Nineteen Indian Kashmiris, mostly elderly and wearing green commemorative caps, defied separatist threats and crossed the metal bridge - painted neutral white for the occasion - hours after 31 Pakistanis walked into India to rebuild divided families.

"I can't control my emotion. I am setting foot in my motherland," said a tearful Shahid Bahar, a lawyer from the capital of Pakistan Kashmir, Muzaffarabad.

"I am coming here for the first time to meet my blood relations," said Mr Bahar, whose father crossed over in 1949. "It was my dream. It is unbelieveable. Everyone is here."

Attacks by Islamic separatists who threatened to turn the buses into rolling coffins scared off some passengers but failed to derail one of the most significant and emotive steps in South Asia's unsteady peace process.

"The caravan of peace has started," Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said as he sent off the Pakistan-bound bus in front of a crowd of thousands braving freezing drizzle at the Lion of Kashmir stadium in Srinagar, summer capital of Indian Kashmir and the region's heart and soul. "Nothing can stop it."

Separatists tried, firing two rifle grenades at one of the Muzaffarabad-bound buses soon after it left. But no one was hurt, the bus was not hit and did not stop.