Pulwama Encounter: The Indian security forces on Tuesday killed three terrorists in an encounter at Tral in South Kashmir’s Pulwama region.
According to DGP Dilbagh Singh, the terrorists belonged to Pakistan-based terror outfit Jaish-e-Mohammed. This comes hours after Pakistan violated the ceasefire in Balakote and Mendhar sectors in Poonch district and resorted to unprovoked firing and shelling.
Earlier, the Indian Army claimed to have launched attacks on terrorist camps in Pakistan controlled Kashmir. The attacks by the Indian Army were apparently in retaliation to the Pakistan Army’s support to push terrorists into Indian territory, news agency ANI reported.
News agency PTI reported that at least four-five terrorists were killed in the shelling by the Indian Army. However, many media outlets reported that over 35 terrorists have been eliminated while Pakistan media claimed that nine Indian soldiers were killed.
According to ANI, the Indian Army used artillery guns to target the terrorist camps opposite the Tangdhar sector, inflicting significant damage to the Pakistani side.
Sources told the news agency that four launch pads in PoK’s Neelam valley were targeted/destroyed, and four to five Pakistan Army soldiers have been killed with several injured.
Sources also said that Defence Minister Rajnath Singh has spoken to Army Chief General Bipin Rawat regarding the situation, and is personally monitoring it. An Indian Army official said Pakistani Army initiated unprovoked ceasefire violations to assist infiltration by terrorists into Indian territory in Tangadhar sector last evening.
“As a result, calibrated escalation of area weapons was undertaken by the Indian side in which terrorist launch pads and several Pakistan Army posts giving incidental protection to these launch pads and certain gun positions were hit,” the official said.
He said Indian Army retains the right to respond at a time and place of its choosing in case Pakistan Army continues to assist terrorist activities from across Indian borders.
Sources told PTI that the pounding of Pakistani positions and terror camps cannot in any way be compared to surgical strikes carried out by the Indian Army in September 2016 on terror launch pads across the Line of Control (LoC).
Meanwhile, Pakistan army claimed that at least nine Indian soldiers were killed and several injured in the fierce exchange of fire across the LoC, but Indian Army sources rejected its claim. EurAsian Times could not independently verify the report.
Pakistan military spokesman Maj Gen Asif Ghafoor tweeted that Pakistan also lost one soldier and three civilians in the skirmishes. Following this, India’s Deputy High Commissioner to Pakistan was also summoned, according to reports.
Earlier on October 20, two soldiers and a civilian were killed after Pakistani troops violated the ceasefire in the same sector in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kupwara district. Three civilians were also injured while two houses were damaged in the firing, police had said.
