The Indian airstrike over the town of Balakot across the Line of Control (LOC) in the early hours of Tuesday shook people in villages nearby out of sleep, fearing another earthquake had hit the region previously devastated by a major tremor in 2005
A villager in Jabba, nearly 30 kilometres away from Balakot claimed he was woken up by five big explosions, followed by sounds of the aircraft in the distance. He added that the bombs had splintered pine trees on the hills and created big craters as they fell on its downward slopes.
“The loud bangs literally shook our houses and then there were sounds of the aircraft. I visited the site at about 10 am and saw four craters at two different places,” said Chaudhry Shafqat Awais, who thought that an earthquake, earlier devouring Balakot and Muzaffarabad in 2005, had now struck them in Jabba.
Another, Mohammad Zakir, said he saw a beam of light after he heard the first explosion during his visit to Jabba. “I heard three other big bangs in succession. It was a horrible sound, I cannot explain to you,” he continued, making note of a 10-feet-deep dent that had appeared in front of his house. He also showed visuals of the craters on his cellphone; a crust of greyish gravel with some fallen pine trees inside.
There were some witnesses who saw trees on fire. A Zahid Hussain Shah said, “There are just some burnt trees and nothing else.”
Other villagers also talked about the incident with some even showing pieces of the ammunition.
Some livestock-breeders also claimed that they saw Pakistan Airforce planes hovering overhead.
It might, however, be evident from a mere look at the area targeted by the airstrike that the India planes had after all dropped bombs while fleeing. There only stood a mud house with literally nothing nearby. The site was still taken over by the armed forces to check for any explosives.
The mud house apparently on the hit lost of Indian fighter jets had an elderly inside at the time of the explosion. Nooran Shah was injured when his door fell on his head and was later discharged after the administration of first aid at a local hospital.No ambulances could be seen tending to the several hundred allegedly killed by Indians. No alleged terrorist was seen fleeing from the much-talked-about military training camp be locals.
King Shah Abdullah Teaching Hospital in Mansehra’s Medical Superintendent, Dr Mohammad Javed Tanoli, claimed that no one–killed or wounded– except Nooran Shah was brought from the location to the only tertiary care hospital in the district.
A local, Shaukat Qureshi, said, “There has been no such activity here, no camp, no militant, nothing. This is total rubbish.”
“There would have been chaos here, had there been casualties of the scale the Indians are claiming, “Dr Javed added.
Yet, the medical superintendent claimed that it was like any other day with routine work and that the government also had not issued an emergency alert.
Mohammad Jibran is a cab driver who regularly uses the route to Balakot city and the district headquarters. He said that he did not found anything out of the ordinary when reported for work on Tuesday but did hear locals talking about an airstrike in the early hours.
The alleged explosion of the militant camp seemed to not have affected the traffic on Mansehra-Naran-Jalkhad road while the local bazaar also appeared busy and bustling. Muhammad Safeer owns a hotel along the road and says, “I did not see a single ambulance running through this road” from Fajr till midnight.
If India is right in claiming these deaths, the bodies would have been evacuated using this route, he added.
Published in Daily Times, February 28th 2019.
