Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday seized on a social media video that purports to show a Jaish-e-Mohammed commander to hail the success of Operation Sindoor, stressing that Pakistan’s duplicity on terror had been exposed by its terrorists.
“Just yesterday, the country and the world saw yet another Pakistani terrorist weeping and recounting his plight. This is new India — one that doesn’t fear anyone’s nuclear threats…. It enters the enemy’s home and hits,” Modi said, addressing an event in Madhya Pradesh’s Dhar on his 75th birthday.
The video, which was widely shared on social media on Tuesday, shows what many claimed was a top JeM commander acknowledging that Indian missiles ravaged the terror outfit’s headquarters in Pakistan’s Bahawalpur on May 7 during Operation Sindoor.
“In defending this country and its borders, we embraced militancy and fought in Delhi, Kabul and Kandahar. After sacrificing everything, on May 7, Indian forces struck in Bahawalpur, tearing apart the family of Maulana Masood Azhar,” the man in the video, identified in some quarters as JeM commander Masood Ilyas Kashmiri, is heard telling a crowd.
Azhar, a proscribed terrorist, is the chief of the JeM, the group behind the Parliament attack in 2001, the strike on the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly in 2000, the attack on the IAF base in Pathankot in 2016 and the Pulwama suicide bombing in 2019.
At the Dhar rally, Modi said the admission had confirmed what India has been saying all along — that Bahawalpur remains the hub of Jaish operations despite Pakistan’s denials.
“Terrorists from Pakistan desecrated the vermilion of our sisters and daughters. Our soldiers destroyed the terrorists’hideouts in Pakistan. Our brave soldiers brought Pakistan to its knees in theblink of an eye,” the Prime Minister said.
Modi was addressing the rally after inaugurating and laying the foundation of development projects.
Modi said September 17 also marked the liberationof Hyderabad.
“On this day, the nation witnessed the steel-like willpower of Sardar Patel. It was on this day that the Indian Army liberated Hyderabad from numerous atrocities and integrated it with India. Hyderabad Liberation Day inspires us with the reminder that nothing is greater than the honour and glory of Mother India,” he said.