At least 26 people died and 13 were injured on Tuesday after some individuals opened fire against the group of tourists from which they were part and with which they were visiting the town of Pahalgam,, as reported by the Reuters agency. The attack in this area of the Himalayas was confirmed by the delegate of the Government of the territory of Jammu and Cashmira, Omar Abdullah, who said yesterday afternoon in his X account that the death toll was “still to be determined.” The shots were made by two or three people in a meadow five kilometers from Pahalgam for which tourists were walking, according to the newspaper Indian Expresswhich cites an unidentified senior police officer.
“This attack is much greater than any other we have seen against civilians in recent years,” Abdullah said on his social networks. The State Health Minister, Sakina Itao, confirmed that a seriously injured was transferred to a health center in Srinagar, the largest city in the state, while the rest were being treated in several public hospitals. “Many civilians who had minor injuries have been discharged. It is an unfortunate and deeply condemnable incident,” Itoo described in statements collected by the local press.
The death toll is still being ascertained so I don’t want to get in to those details. They will be officially conveyed as the situation becomes clearer. Needless to say this attack is much larger than anything we’ve seen directed at civilians in recent years.
– Omar Abdullah (@omarabdullah)
The Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi, condemned the attack, which he described as a terrorist attack. “Those behind this atrocious act will be taken before justice,” he threatened. Modi also indicated that the “determination to fight terrorism is unwavering and will strengthen even more.” In turn, India Interior Minister Amit Shah moved yesterday to the affected region and convened a meeting with army officers, paramilitaries and police.
So far the arrest of any person has not been notified, although the police reported that several members of the security forces were quickly sent to the place of the attack. A small nationalist militant group, known as Kashmir resistance, was attributed hours later the responsibility of the attack with a social networks statement collected by Reuters. In the text, the group also expressed its discontent for the settlement of more than 85,000 “outsiders” in the region, which has driven, they affirm, a “demographic change”.
I strongly condemn the terror attack in Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir. Condolences to those who have lost their loved ones. I pray that the injured recover at the earliest. All possible assistance is being provided to those affected.
Those behind this heinous act will be brought…
– Narendra Modi (@narendramodi)
Several survivors assured the newspaper India Today That the insurgent assumptions approached them when they were in the meadow and began to shoot them at a short distance, claiming that some were not Muslims. Since it can only be accessed on foot or horse, the most serious injured had to be transferred to the hospital by helicopter, while the slightest ones went walking.
Pahalgam – popularly known as the “Switzerland of the Himalayas” – is a tourist area located in Kashmiro, a region located on the border with Pakistan that has been the subject of an intense territorial dispute between the two nuclear powers. The control of the territory of Jammu and Kashmira, the only Muslim majority in India, has faced the two countries in four wars (1947, 1965, 1971 and 1999).
In 2019, Modi’s nationalist government decided to eliminate the autonomy regime from which Cashmiro enjoyed for 72 years and the control became directly dependent on New Delhi ,.
The worst attack in recent years in the Indian Kashmir took place in 2019, when a car bomb killed 33 agents of a police convoy.
