Hours after a dozen IAF jets pounded terror camps across LoC, India confirmed the action, saying it had targeted the biggest training camp of Jaish-e-Mohammad, the terror group involved in the February 14 attack on a CRPF convoy that claimed over 40 jawans
Army has shot down a Pakistani spy drone in Gujarat
Indian Army has shot down a Pakistani spy drone in Abdasa village, in Kutch, Gujarat. Army and police personnel present at the spot.
Doval along with Indian Army Chief and IAF Chief review the security situation:
NSA Ajit Doval along with Indian Army Chief Bipin Rawat and IAF Chief BS Dhanoa is reviewing the security situation on the borders after Indian Air Force strikes at JeM terror camp in Balakot across LoC.
When 4 young IAF pilots hit a Pakistani airbase 50 years ago
The daring raid inside Pakistani territory was carried out by the IAF during the Bangladesh war in 1971.
Today's surgical air strikes on the terror camp at Balakot deep inside Pakistan is unprecedented because it is the first time Indian AIr Force (IAF) has penetrated so deep into Pakistani territory in a peace-time operation. IAF jets crossed the LoC (Line of Actual Control), the entire Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK), and then hit the target inside Khyber Pakhtukhwa.
Another daring raid inside Pakistani territory was carried out by the IAF during the Bangladesh war in 1971. Though it can't be called a surgical strike, the 1971 raid was an equally bold operation by four young Indian fighter pilots who penetrated into the enemy airspace. They were tasked to hit the enemy planes parked at Murid airbase in Pakistan.
On December 8, 1971, Squadron Leader RN Bharadwaj, Flying Officer VK Heble, Flying Officer BC Karambaya and Flight Lieutenant AL Deoskar flew Hunter jets to the Murid airbase located 120 kilometres inside Pakistan.
We were a four-aircraft formation. Aircraft 1 and 2 went ahead on schedule. 3 and 4 were asked to delay their attack by a minute and a half. There was lot of ack ack fire in the sky. We broke radio silence and the lead aircraft told me 'I just clobbered a four-engine aircraft in the pen," BC Karambaya, who won a Vir Chakra in 1971 and retired several years later as a Wing Commander, was quoted as saying in an Aapkasamachar report.
There was black all round. I saw what I thought were MiG-19s [infact, the Chinese F-6, a copy of the Russian MiG-19] in a blast pen. Deoskar spotted another. I fired a small burst - a refuelling bowser caught fire. I kept on firing and was at a height of only 300 feet and the aircraft started rocking - I had clearly been hit by ack ack fire. I said, 'I am ejecting.'
We were a four-aircraft formation. Aircraft 1 and 2 went ahead on schedule. 3 and 4 were asked to delay their attack by a minute and a half. There was lot of ack ack fire in the sky. We broke radio silence and the lead aircraft told me 'I just clobbered a four-engine aircraft in the pen," BC Karambaya, who won a Vir Chakra in 1971 and retired several years later as a Wing Commander, was quoted as saying in an NDTV report.
According to the Aapkasamachar report, what Karambaya or the other pilots in the attack on Murid didn't know at the time was that they had just participated in perhaps the greatest offensive counter-air operation in the history of the IAF, the success of which has been highlighted in a new book 47 years after the 1971 war.
In his new book, 'In The Ring and On Its Feet - Pakistan Air Force in the 1971 Indo-Pak war', Pakistan's premier military aviation historian Air Commodore M Kaiser Tufail (retd.) has stated that IAF Hunters belonging to 20 Squadron destroyed 5 PAF F-86 Sabres on the ground in Murid. The F-86 wasn't just any fighter - the Sabre was the premier fighter of the Pakistan Air Force and the single biggest challenge for the Indian Air Force in air battles in both the 1965 and 1971 wars, a jet that shot down several IAF fighters in air-to-air combat and inflicted heavy damage to ground targets in Indian territory.
Ironically, the official Ministry of Defence commissioned history of the Indian Air Force, published after the 1971 war, makes no claim on the destruction of the Sabres, claims the report.
According to the report, the only reference to the December 8 mission is attributed to a book written by a former Pakistan Army Major General and says, "In two counter-air missions by the IAF, five aircraft were destroyed on the ground at Murid and Chaklala".
Surgical strikes not possible due to difficult terrain, dense forests, steep hills (Source: ET NOW)
Pakistani drone shot down near Gujarat border
Debris of the UAV was seen near Nanghatad village in Abdasa taluka of Kutch, police sources said.
BHUJ: A Pakistani unmanned aerial vehicle(UAV) was on Tuesday shot down near the International Border in Kutch district of Gujarat, police sources said.
Debris of the UAV was seen near Nanghatad village in Abdasa taluka of Kutch, they said.
On hearing a loud sound around 6 am, villagers went to the spot and found the debris of the UAV, the sources said.
On hearing a loud sound around 6 am, villagers went to the spot and found the debris of the UAV, the sources said.
Asked if a Pakistani UAV had been shot down by the Indian armed forces, a police official, on condition of anonymity, said, "Such an incident has happened, we are investigating the matter."
The official, however, refused to elaborate further.
Earlier, government sources said that in a pre-dawn strike, combat jets of Indian Air Force bombed terror camps at multiple locations across the Line of Control on the Pakistani side, 12 days after Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed terror group carried out the dastardly Pulwama attack in Kashmir.
They said the IAF's Mirage 2000 fighter jets pounded the terror camps in Balakot, Muzaffarabad and Chakoti in the well-planned strike destroying Jaish-e-Mohammed terror camps.
