Pahalgam attack comes days before Northern Command set for change in guard

The Pahalgam terror strike, a rare targeted attack on tourists, comes days ahead of a change of guard at the Udhampur-based Northern Command, the nerve centre of counterterrorism operations in Jammu and Kashmir.

The Northern Army commander Lieutenant General MV Suchindra Kumar will retire on April 30. Kumar was in Delhi on Tuesday for a retiring officers’ seminar but flew back to Srinagar for a first-hand assessment of the situation unfolding in Kashmir, people aware of the matter said. Lieutenant General Pratik Sharma, who is the deputy chief of army staff (strategy) at the Army headquarters here, is expected to succeed Kumar at the Northern Command, HT learns.

The attack comes at a time when tourists were making a beeline for popular destinations in J&K, including Srinagar, Gulmarg and Pahalgam. “Tourists used to hesitate to go to the Lal Chowk in Srinagar earlier, but the daily footfalls were upwards of 10,000 with the situation in the Kashmir valley returning to normalcy,” said a person with knowledge of developments.

The recent opening of cinema halls --- two in Srinagar and one in Baramulla --- was also an indicator of how things had changed in the area. According to official data, 144 terrorists were killed in J&K (including the line of control) during the last two years.

Previous attacks such as those in Pulwama and Uri drew a muscular response from the government, leading to the Balakot air strikes in Pakistan 2019 and the cross-border surgical strikes in Pakistan-occupied Kashmir in 2016, respectively.

Last year, defence minister Rajnath Singh said if terrorists try to disrupt peace or attempt to carry out terror activities in the country, India will give them a crushing reply and hunt them down even in Pakistan, voicing the government’s resolve to take on terror even on foreign soil.

In January, army chief General Upendra Dwivedi said the violence level in J&K was being orchestrated by Pakistan, where terror infrastructure was intact.

“We inducted 15,000 additional troops in 2024 and that’s why the violence level has gone down... we have been able to neutralise 73 terrorists (in 2024) out of which 60% were from Pakistan. The parliamentary and assembly elections had almost 60% voting each. It means that the local population is going with peace,” he said.

He said 80% of the terrorists operating in J&K were from Pakistan.