LEH, India -- India and Pakistan are exchanging daily fire on the Line of Control dividing their armies in the north, but fighting has gone down dramatically since June, the Indian Army commander for the region said.

Lieutenant-General Rajinder Singh also said in an interview with Reuters that militants from Afghanistan had been brought into forward positions on the Pakistani side of the line during May and June, but had since been pulled back.

Singh, head of the 14th corps, said 200 to 300 rounds of artillery were being exchanged daily in the area under his command -- covering the Line of Control, or ceasefire line, in the Himalayan region of Ladakh, north of Kashmir.

But this was down from 5,000 a day in May and June - when the nuclear-armed neighbors came to the brink of war over Kashmir.

The 14th corps covers some of the most sensitive parts of the Line of Control, including Kargil, scene of a major border conflict in 1999, and the Siachen Glacier, the world's highest battlefield.

"As far as the situation on the LC is concerned, I'd put it that it is as normal as it can be," Singh said.

He was speaking on Friday, just before Pakistan accused India of having launched an air and ground assault on a military post near Kargil the day before. India denied launching any attack.

Singh said the heaviest fighting during May and June had been in Dras, near Kargil, where Pakistani troops occasionally target the road linking Kashmir with Ladakh.

"During May, June it had intensified. Now it has come down to normal," he said.

He denied newspaper reports that the two armies, facing each other from mountain posts, had tried to take new ground recently.

"There has been no change in the status quo of the LC in my area. It remains as it was," he said, adding that there had been "no visible attempts" to change positions since 1999.

"You see if they see any movement, or they perceive perhaps any threat from anywhere, they resort to firing. As far as we are concerned, we do the same."

_________ Shelling Worse Than in Afghanistan _____________ India accuses Pakistan of helping Islamic militants to infiltrate across the Line of Control to join a separatist rebellion against Indian rule in Kashmir. Pakistan says it gives only moral support to the Kashmiri "freedom struggle".

Singh said Indian intercepts of communications from the Pakistani side of the Line of Control had shown the presence militants, including those from the Afghanistan-based Al-Qaeda -- blamed for the September 11 attacks on the United States.

"We had intercepts that he (Pakistan) had concentrated some Al-qaeda members, some militants along some of these posts in the forward locations," he said. But unable to get through Indian defenses, "as per our information, these people have been pulled back to depth areas."

India has frequently said that militants from Al-Qaeda and Afghanistan's former Taleban rulers had fled to Pakistani Kashmir after escaping from the U.S.-led campaign in Afghanistan.

Pakistan denies the charge and there is no independent confirmation of either side's statements.

Asked how the Indian Army knew where the militants were from, Singh said the intercepts mentioned Al Qaeda.

In one intercept, he said, one militant complained that "this kind of shelling, we have not seen even in Afghanistan".

In another, from the Pakistani Army, "They said that these people, our guests who are here with us, they are only eating rations, not doing any work. "They are suffering from some disease and we want these people to be moved out."

Singh said that there were regular exchanges of fire on the Siachen Glacier -- which runs up towards the border with China. "The guns have never been quiet in this area although the intensity has not been so much," he said. "The exchange of fire that we are having in Siachen has been almost constant.