In the dead of the night, when silence speaks, a cocktail of lethal Indian precision munitions hovered ominously over Pakistan skies. Like a mosquito that’s spotted a rich vein of blood, each of the SCALP and HAMMER weapons locked in on their unsuspecting quarry. Within seconds of the strike, pictures of the resultant destruction were relayed back to Prime Minister Narendra Modi who was awaiting word in a command centre.

Modi was hoping to inflict “unimaginable punishment" upon Pakistan-sponsored plotters of the Pahalgam attack. And the real-time video feed of the operation he was scrutinising did not disappoint him. Perhaps, the military action was divined to succeed. For Sindoor is the vermilion red powder that many traditional Indian women wear in their hair parting, only to remove it if they become widowed. And since in Pahalgam, several women were widowed, Operation Sindoor’s name was powerfully prescient.

In a span of 30 minutes, nine terror havens, some in Pakistan’s beating heart of Punjab, were reduced to rubble. Several top terrorist masterminds lay dead or critically injured. Pakistan army’s pride was........

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