‘There ought to be a response to terrorists & Pakistan too’: India’s security grid mulls countermeasure

The Indian security establishment is mulling over the response to the Pahalgam terrorist attack.

Terrorists killed at least 26 people in the Baisaran area of Pahalgam in Anantnag district of Jammu and Kashmir on Tuesday. Witnesses and sources said that terrorists initially opened indiscriminate fire and then singled out non-Muslims and shot them. In recent years, this is the worst attack in J&K after the Pulwama attack in which 49 security services personnel were killed.

The view of the Indian security establishment is that there ought to be an Indian response to the attack and such a response should hit at not just the terrorists who carried out the attack but also their sponsors, according to CNN-News 18.

More from India

Pulwama: Did PM Modi hint at a military strike? Clues in what he said after Uri, Pulwama terror attacks Delhi, Mumbai and more: How Pahalgam terror attack has put other cities on high alert

Read full coverage of the Pahalgam terrorist attack here

The Resistance Front (TRF), a group believed to be an offshoot of the Pakistani terrorist group Lashkar-e-Taiba , has claimed responsibility of the attack. The handlers of TRF and LeT and their sponsors are all based in Pakistan and have terrorist launchpads in Pakistan-Occupied-Kashmir.

In the wake of the attack, Prime Minister Narendra Modi cut short his visit to Saudi Arabia and arrived in India on Wednesday morning.

Modi held a meeting with External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, and Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri at the Delhi airport.

Impact Shorts

More Shorts

'New dawn': PM Modi meets Manipur violence victims in first visit since 2023 unrest

CP Radhakrishnan takes oath as Vice President of India

Modi will also chair a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS) today.

“Also, the manner in which the attack was carried out — with terrorists telling the survivors to ‘go tell your government and Modi’ is a dare to the Indian government. Hindu men were targeted while women and children watched on in horror," a senior government official told CNN-News18.

Sine 2014, the Modi government has often conducted cross-border operations in response to major attacks. Firstly, in response to an attack in Manipur that killed 20 soldiers, India conducted surgical strikes inside Myanmar to target camps of insurgents from northeastern India. Secondly, in response to an attack in J&K’s Uri in 2016, India conducted surgical strikes at terrorist camps inside POK. Thirdly, in response to the Pulwama attack in 2019, India struck a facility of the Jaish-e-Mohammed in Balakot of Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.