SOURCE: Hindustan Times
The central government will celebrate the fourth anniversary of 2016’s surgical strikes against terrorist camps in Pakistan Occupied Kashmir by the Indian army on September 28.
The strike on the night of September 27-28 in 2016 was in response to an attack by Pakistan on an army base in Kashmir’s Uri on September 18 in which 19 soldiers were killed.
Here is all you need to know about Surgical Strike Day:
• Pakistan army launched a deadly attack on a military base in Uri, killing 19 Indian soldiers on September 18, 2016.
• The army responded by conducting surgical strikes against terror pads in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.
• The attack was carried out under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, defence minister Manohar Parrikar and National Security Adviser (NSA) Ajit Doval. “India will neither forgive nor forget,” PM Modi had declared less than a week after the Uri attack.
• The army’s build-up for the strikes began on September 24. The special forces squads set out for the mission armed with night-vision devices, Tavor 21 and AK-47 assault rifles, rocket-propelled grenades, shoulder-fired missiles, Heckler and Koch pistols, high explosive grenades and plastic explosives. The teams were 30-strong each and had specific targets.
• The plan was such that teams with distant targets left early on September 27 evening so that all strikes would be coordinated. The instructions were that all teams would engage the terrorists simultaneously so that none could rescue another.
• Civilians living close to border in Jammu and Kashmir and Punjab were evacuated started at 10 pm on September 27, before Indian soldiers went across.
• Sentries at the launchpads were neutralised by snipers before the troops went in and finished the job.
• All teams returned to their bases by 9 am on September 28. One Indian army soldier lost his life in the operation.
• Army said Indian soldiers razed six launchpads to the ground and gunned down 45 terrorists at various locations.
• In 2018, two years after the attack, the government decided to celebrate September 28 as ‘Surgical Strike Day’.
