Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi interrupted a two -day visit to Saudi Arabia and returned to New Delhi after an attack in the contested region of Kashmir killed at least 26 people, most tourists.
Security has been reinforced through cashmere, and Indian forces have launched a human hunt for the authors of one of the deadliest attacks to strike the recent Himalayas region.
Tens of thousands of armed police officers and soldiers died in the region and erected additional control points, searched by cars and would summon former activists for interrogation.
Police described the massacre as “terrorist attack” and blamed the militants fighting against Indian domination in cashmere, but there was no immediate complaint.
The officials said that 24 of the people killed were Indian tourists, while one was Nepal and a local tourist guide. At least 17 others were injured.
In a post on X, Modi said that the authors “will not be spared”.
“I firmly condemn the terrorist attack in Pahalgam, Jammu-et-Cachemire,” he wrote. “Condolences to those who have lost their loved ones. I pray that the wounded recover as soon as possible. Any possible help is provided to affected people.”
On Wednesday, the Indian Minister of the Interior, Amit Shah, attended a ceremony in a police control room in Srinagar, joining tributes to tourists killed and meeting the families of several victims.
Shah has sworn to “get a highlight on the authors of the most difficult consequences”.
Later, Shah visited the murder site, a meadow about 5 km from Pahalgam seaside resort. Often compared to Switzerland because of its snowy mountains and its pine forests, the area is visited by hundreds of tourists every day.
Meanwhile, security officials intensified research operations to drive out the attackers and the Indian army said in a statement that his efforts “focused on the translating of assailants in court”.
The soldiers used helicopters to search the mountainous and wooded area for any sign of the attackers.
The incident coincides with a visit to India by the US vice-president JD Vance, with whom the government of Modi desperately tries to negotiate an agreement which will facilitate the punishing prices imposed by the Trump administration.
Vance warned this week that if India and the United States cannot work together, “the 21st century could be a very dark moment for all humanity”.
Divided for decades
India and Pakistan each administer different parts of the cashmere, but both claim the territory in its entirety.
ADVERTISEMENTActivists of the part controlled by the Kashmir Indians are fighting against the reign of New Delhi since 1989, and many Muslim Cashmiris support the objective of the Union rebels the territory, whether under Pakistani domination or as an independent country.
The Indian government considers activism in cashmere as terrorism supported by Pakistan, an affirmation that Pakistan denies.
Tens of thousands of civilians, rebels and government forces were killed in the conflict. Human rights groups say that India has used excessively brutal tactics to keep control of the region, giving its armed forces to arrest, torture and execution briefly.
In recent years have seen violence refused in the cashmere valley, historically the heart of the anti-Indian rebellion, with fights between government forces and rebels moving towards remote areas of the Jammu region.
ADVERTISEMENTIn 2019, months before New Delhi revealed the autonomy of the region, a bomb attack of activists from the Southern Pulwama district killed at least 40 paramilitary soldiers and injured dozens of others.
The cashmere has seen a series of fatal attacks against Hindus, including immigrant workers from the Indian states, since New Delhi unilaterally ended the semi-autonomous status of the region in 2019 and radically slowed down dissent, civil freedoms and media freedoms.
New Delhi vigorously promoted tourism to cashmere as an indicator of peace and stability, and the region duly attracted millions of visitors to take advantage of its Himalayan foothills and extremely decorated cleaning boats – this in the middle of a strange order kept by security control points, armored vehicles and omnipreed patrolling soldiers.
Until Tuesday, tourists did not fall in the grip of violence.
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