Locals of Balakot, an earthquake-prone town in Pakistan’s Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province thought the bomb explosions were a tremor but it was Indian Air Force who had struck terror training camps.
Image source: AP
Locals of Balakot, a town in Pakistan’s Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province on Tuesday told BBC Urdu, “We woke up by ‘loud explosions’ and thought a fresh tremor must have hit the region when Indian Air Force jets pounded a large terror training camp.”
Balakot often experiences tremors and in 2005 Kashmir earthquake, Saudi Arabia rebuilt the demolished areas of the city.
Mohammad Adil, a farmer in Jaba village, said he and his family were woken at about 03:00 by “a huge explosion”.
He said they thought an earth quake must have hit the region.
“Then we heard jets flying over. We went to the place in the morning. There was a huge crater and four or five houses were destroyed,” he said.
Residents in several towns near Balakot reported hearing explosions early on Tuesday.
The IAF dropped a payload of 1,000 kg bombs on three control rooms of Jaish-e-Mohammed – Balakot, Chakoti, and Muzzafarabad on Tuesday killing up to 350 terrorists who were responsible for killing 40 CRPF soldiers in south Kashmir’s Pulwama.
The pre-dawn operation, described as “non-military” and “preemptive”, struck a five-star resort style camp on a hilltop forest. Pakistan Army spokesman Major General Asif Ghafoor, however, said the strikes caused no casualties.
He tweeted that Pakistani jets were scrambled and forced the Indian fighter planes to make a “hasty withdrawal”, dropping their payload in an open area.
(with inputs from PTI)
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