Blaring air raid sirens on Friday morning, warning against a possible incoming aerial threat from Pakistan, sent a wave of apprehension and unease through the normally laid-back and bohemian city of Chandigarh, 250km north of New Delhi.
Almost instantly, all schools closed, shops downed their shutters and thousands of office-goers hurried home, fearful of a loitering munitions drone or missile strike attack on the Chandimandir cantonment, headquarters of a critical Pakistan-focused military facility and several surrounding fighter aircraft bases.
The nervousness among the crowds across the city was palpable, as a day earlier, when military tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbours were burgeoning, security officials in Delhi had revealed that Chandigarh was one of 15 places targeted by Pakistani armed drones and long-range projectiles.
The attack on the city, which like all 14 others was successfully thwarted by air-defence systems, was in response to Indian Air Force combat aircraft attacking nine alleged Islamist terror camps inside Pakistan early on Wednesday.
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The screeching sirens terrified me into rushing home
— Ruth Tani
This strike came two weeks after Delhi accused Islamabad – which denied the charges – of involvement in theterrorist attack in Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir on April 22nd, which killed 26 tourists.
“The screeching sirens terrified me into rushing home, as local civil defence officials had told us to do when they went off,” said gourmet cook Ruth Tani. An atmosphere of fear and panic, she said, was mounting as hostilities between the Indian and Pakistani militaries showed no sign of abating.
Another Chandigarh resident, banker Vinod Thakur,was convinced the military situation would quickly escalate, leading to heightened protective systems in Chandigarh to counter the possibility of civilian casualties. The situation, he said, is highly worrisome and its outcome unknown given that both sides are nuclear-armed.
On Thursday night, authorities had enforced a blackout across Chandigarh as a “precautionary” measure by shutting off all power across the city, and a similar shutdown was also imposed on Friday, following intelligence of more airborne strikes by Pakistan on the city’s military bases.
[ Pakistan denies carrying out multiple attacks on India’s western borderOpens in new window ]
All commercial flights from the city’s bustling international airport have been suspended and the facility has been appropriated by the military, while local city community centres have been specified for use by the army. Dedicated traffic corridors have also been created to facilitate rapid movement of military convoys en route to the border.
Enduring tension between India and Pakistan has cast a shadow of grave concern over the entire adjoining region of Punjab and Haryana states, of which Chandigarh is the joint capital. Civil defence officials have enforced blackouts and excavated protective trenches, while also supervising mock firefighting and casualty evacuation drills.
This reporter’s ancestral village of Dera Baba Nanak, better known as DBN in military parlance, just two kilometres from the Pakistani border in Punjab, is once again readying to receive soldiers and field guns in sombre anticipation of full-scale hostilities erupting with Pakistan.
Village elders recall the fierce battles that raged there in the 1965 and 1971 wars with Pakistan, when all women and children - including this writer - were dispatched to nearby towns for safety.
