An inconsolable Kamakshi Prasanna fought back tears as she thanked the government for conducting Operation Sindoor, crediting the strikes on terror targets for bringing some relief to families like hers who lost their loves ones in the Pahalgam attack.
Ms Prasanna's husband Madhusudan Rao was shot dead by terrorists at the Baisaran meadow in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam on April 22. "PM Modi took the onus to take revenge. This must bring some relief to families. People think we lost our husbands, but we have lost our lives," she told ANI, on being asked about the significance of Operation Sindoor's name.
"26 families are shattered now. This should not happen to anyone in India," the Kerala-based woman said.
The operation was conducted early on Wednesday, when military strikes hit nine terror targets in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir, in response to the Pahalgam terror attack. Among the targets were the Jaish-e-Mohammad stronghold of Bahawalpur and Lashkar-e-Taiba's base in Muridke.
At least 13 people, including four children and a soldier, were killed and 57 injured as the Pakistan army responded to the strikes with one of the most intense artillery and mortar shelling in years targeting forward villages along the Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir. People in some border villages of Ferozepur district in Punjab began moving to safer areas amid soaring cross-border tensions.
The government is briefing an all-party meeting on Thursday on the success of "Operation Sindoor" and its aftermath, as top government functionaries and opposition leaders met for a second time in a fortnight amid rising tensions between India and Pakistan following the Pahalgam terror attack on April 22.
Union ministers Rajnath Singh, Amit Shah, S Jaishankar, J P Nadda and Nirmala Sitharaman represented the government, while Rahul Gandhi and Mallikarjun Kharge from the Congress, Sandip Bandyopadhyay of the Trinamool Congress and DMK's T R Baalu were among the leading opposition figures in the meeting.
