Flooded Escape Tunnels Trapped Pahalgam Killers. Forces Hunted Them Down

An all-nighter by Union Home Minister Amit Shah, scientists working through the night, a special plane from Srinagar to Chandigarh, and test-firing to match bullet casings -- it took all of this to confirm that the three terrorists killed in Operation Mahadev near Srinagar Monday were the same monsters who murdered 26 innocents in cold blood in Pahalgam's Baisaran Valley on April 22.

According to sources in the government, the Home Minister wanted to be sure before informing the Parliament that the three terrorists killed in Operation Mahadev are the ones involved in the Pahalgam attack. He was up through Monday night and constantly monitored the developments at the Chandigarh Forensic Science Laboratory over phone and video calls as scientists matched bullet casings and guns recovered after Operation Mahadev. Sources said the Home Minister was up till 5 am, communicating with scientists for a confirmation, and rested for a few hours before heading to Parliament for the big day.

Addressing the Lok Sabha during the Operation Sindoor debate yesterday, Mr Shah said, "There is no room for doubt. I am holding the ballistic report, six scientists have cross-checked it and confirmed to me over video call that the bullets fired at Pahalgam and the bullets fired from these guns are a 100 per cent match."

Operation Mahadev: 3 Terrorists Gunned Down

As Defence Minister Rajnath Singh began the debate on Operation Sindoor in Parliament on Monday, an encounter was underway at Lidwas near Srinagar. A joint team of the Army, CRPF and Jammu and Kashmir police had zeroed in on a hideout after weeks of constantly intercepting terrorists' communication. In the gunfight that followed, three terrorists were gunned down and sophisticated weapons such as assault rifles and rifle grenades were recovered.

The forces suspected that these three terrorists were the Pahalgam killers, but the government wanted to leave no room for doubt before it went public. So, while multiple media reports linked Operation Mahadev to the Pahalgam attack, no official confirmation came through.

A Perfect Match

Security forces had earlier arrested some local residents on charges of assisting the terrorists. They were brought in for the identification of the bodies of the three killed in Lidwas. They confirmed that the terrorists killed in Mahadev were the killers of Pahalgam. But this was not enough. The government insisted on a foolproof match.

The terrorists' weapons recovered after Operation Mahadev were then flown to Chandigarh on a special plane. An Air Force cargo plane flew a machine from Ahmedabad to Chandigarh. At the Chandigarh forensic lab, shots were fired from the weapons recovered. The empty bullet casings, generated after the test firing, were then matched with the casings recovered from Baisaran Valley after the attack. It was a 99 per cent match, according to sources.

During this entire process, the Home Minister was constantly in touch with the scientists till the final report was ready and sent to him, the sources added.

Guns Never Fired After Pahalgam

During the matching experiments, Home Minister Shah was told that the last time the terrorists' guns -- an M9 and two AK-47s -- were fired was during the Pahalgam attack. For three months, the terrorists Suleiman, Afghani and Jibran -- were in hiding. All of them Pakistani nationals, they could not return because of the security forces' strategy to prevent their escape.

According to sources, the home minister and security hawks chalked out this strategy when he flew to Kashmir hours after the Pahalgam attack. Mr Shah, sources said, had made it clear to the forces that the terrorists must not succeed in returning to Pakistan.

The forces identified an 8-km path that they could use to cross over and security was beefed up in that region. The forces located secret tunnels used by the terrorists for infiltration and dug up to flood them. This blocked the routes and foiled their escape plans. Eventually, the forces tracked them down and eliminated them.