The thing is, there is something called an escalation ladder whose lowest-most rung is cross-border firing and the highest is nuclear exchange. In between there are heavy artillery shelling, surgical strikes, precision strikes using air-power and a limited conventional war.

So there are a lot of rungs, a lot of options available for the civilian leadership to choose from to punish Pakistan for its horrific deed against India.

Thankfully, unlike the war-hawks in the media, the civilian leadership is sensible and it will precisely choose which option would be the most effective. And honestly, had these deaths been of politicians, then and only then there would have been a war. As much as we think, the civilian leadership, irrespective of whichever party is in power, doesn't value military blood that much as we, the deluded commoners, would like to think so. So yeah, there won't be a war. At best, there will be a combination of the 3-4 lower rungs of the escalation ladder in various sectors on the border.