The Indian Army on Monday (May 19, 2025) said that Pakistan had attempted to target the Golden Temple (Harmandir Sahib), the sacred place of worship for the Sikhs in Punjab’s Amritsar, in the wake of India’s action against terror attacks emanating from Pakistan. The drone and missile attacks were successfully thwarted by the Indian Army, a senior Army official said.
Pakistan attempted to target the Golden Temple with drones and missiles on the intervening night of May 7-8.
“The Indian Army is a professional, righteous, and responsible force which, in spite of grave provocations, has always responded in a calibrated and measured manner. We targeted only terrorists in known terrorist camps with precision weapons, ensuring that there is no collateral damage, a fact which even the Pakistan Army has admitted during Operation Sindoor,” Major General Kartik C. Seshadri, General Officer Commanding (GOC) of the 15 Infantry Division, said in Amritsar, demonstrating India’s air defence system, including the indigenous Akash missiles and the L-70 air defence guns that had intercepted the Pakistani drones and missiles.
“However, the Pakistan Army has no legitimate targets to strike inside India nor does it have the knowledge or capability to stand up to the Indian armed forces face-to-face. Hence, it uses terrorism as a national policy and resorts to unmanned aerial weapons launched from its own soil. Drones and long-range missiles were launched and fired from its own territory, which were his (Pakistan’s) mainstay. Indian military installations, civilian population centres, including innocent ladies and children, were also not spared and were considered as legitimate targets by the Pakistan military,” the GOC said.
The senior officer said that Pakistan had even targeted religious places specifically, including the internationally renowned Golden Temple, a “place of faith for everybody”. “It saw a surfeit of drone and missile attacks which were thwarted bravely by our Army air defence gunners. The Indian armed forces and Army air defence gunners will continue to defeat all his (Pakistan’s) designs and thwart all aerial threats always,” Maj. Gen. Seshadri said.
Published – May 19, 2025 08:41 pm IST
