On April 22, around 2.45 pm, a group of armed men clothed in camouflage fatigues shot dead 26 innocent tourists in the Baisaran meadow, 7 km from Pahalgam in Kashmir. Most victims were Hindus. After the mayhem, the perpetrators melted away from the spot.

An outfit named The Resistance Front (TRF), an offshoot of Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT), based in Pakistan, claimed credit for the attack. Strangely, the TRF retracted its claim after a couple of days, and Pakistan quickly disassociated itself from the massacre. Interestingly, when India approached the United Nations to designate TRF as a terrorist outfit, it was Pakistan which vehemently opposed it.

Post the attack, the Indian government took a series of decisions, including closure of the border, immediate return of all Pakistanis visiting India, reduction of officials in the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi from 55 to 30, and holding of the Indus Water Treaty in abeyance till Pakistan takes effective action to prevent cross-border terrorism.

Pakistan retaliated by expelling Indian diplomats and officials from the High Commission of India in Islamabad and suspended bilateral talks, limited visas for Indian nationals to Pakistan, limited cross-border trade across the LoC and the Wagah-Attari border, threatened to suspend the Simla Agreement, and sought support from China, Turkey, the UN and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC).

Operation Sindoor: On the nights of May 6 and 7, the Indian Air Force and Army undertook measured and meticulously crafted precision attacks on nine terrorist sites in Pakistan, including those of the Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) headquarters in........

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