SOUTH ASIA EMIGRANTS FEEL UNEASY.

Byline: Staff and Wire Services

SANTA CLARA, Calif. - Babita Bais speaks with her family back in Delhi, India, every week. On a recent call she had a simple message for them: Get out if you can.

``I just feel very scared,'' Bais said as she shopped at an Indian market in this Silicon Valley city. ``They should probably think of having a bunker underground.''

Indians and Pakistanis living in America were following closely the two nations' dispute over the Kashmir region, supplementing U.S. news reports by reading Indian and Pakistani media Web sites and calling or e-mailing relatives.

Some deeply feared that the South Asian rivals would soon plunge into war; others dismissed the current tensions as little more than rhetoric and have planned trips back to the area - even though the United States has urged American citizens in India to leave the country.

Smoking a cigarette outside his Bolywood Video store in Canoga Park, Prakash Mehrotra, 26, said he worries about his mother, father and brother who live in Calcutta. He spends $10 every other day, calling his family.

``I was supposed to fly out to India next weekend,'' he said. ``And I was thinking twice. It's a very scary situation.''

Local Pakistanis expressed similar concerns.

Omar Haroon, 25, said he and his wife are communicating via e-mail to their relatives in Karachi.

``I'm very concerned,'' he said. ``I'm really worried.''

Ayaz Khan, 23, spoke with his mother and father by phone Monday morning. They are from Karachi but were in Saudi Arabia on a business trip that day.

``My dad and mom are nervous,'' he said. ``They're saying extra prayers. My dad's a little bit more calm, but my mom said, 'Pick up your prayers.' It's kind of shocking that they're more worried than I was.''

At the Bharat Bazar, which sits in a stretch of Silicon Valley known as Little India, almost every person in the shop selling Indian groceries, videos and saris had a strong opinion on the situation - though their viewpoints ranged widely.

``You feel helpless,'' said Pankaj Kaul, whose wife and 4-year-old child live in Kashmir. At Kaul's urging, they plan to leave the land his family has lived on for generations to stay for a few months with his uncles in southern India, an area farther from the flash-point region.

``I'm asking when are they leaving, have they booked their flight tickets and train?'' said Kaul, 34, who noted that he feels a closer connection to India than Pakistan.

But 20 miles away in Fremont, sitting on a patio outside the Chaat Cafe, restaurant manager Tahir Zahoor said he still plans to take his wife and three children to visit his parents and brothers in Pakistan this summer.

``In my mind, war is not going to happen,'' he said.

Sharat Singh echoed the sentiment as he lunched on naan bread and chicken tikka masala to the energetic beat of Bollywood music. ``It's a lot of saber rattling,'' said the computer engineer, 36, whose parents, cousins, aunts and uncles live in India.

At the Madras Pavilion restaurant in Dallas, Raghu Chandra said he isn't worried about his parents and brothers. ``Things like this have been going on in India for a long, long time,'' Chandra said. ``The people are used to it.''

India and Pakistan have fought two wars over Kashmir, which is divided between them by a 1972 negotiated line of control that generally follows a cease-fire line established in 1949.