India fired missiles across the border into Pakistani ‘terror camps’ in Kashmir, days after it blamed Islamabad for a deadly attack on the Indian side of the contested region.

The long-simmering conflict between the neighboring nuclear powers intensified dramatically overnight.

Fighter jets roared through the skies over the Himalayan territory early Wednesday and the sounds of explosions could be heard near the so-called Line of Control. 

‘A little while ago, the Indian Armed Forces launched “OPERATION SINDOOR”, hitting terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir from where terrorist attacks against India have been planned and directed’, the Indian government said in a statement in the early hours of Wednesday morning. 

The Indian army added that no Pakistani military facilities had been targeted, noting that India had ‘demonstrated considerable restraint in selection of targets and method of execution’.

Eight people have died including two children, and at least 35 Pakistanis have been injured, a spokesperson for the Pakistani military told BBC. Pakistan Information Minister Tarar Attaullah also claimed the country had shot down three Indian jets and one Indian drone on Wednesday morning. 

India has claimed that ‘no Pakistani civilian, economic or military targets have been hit’ in the missile attacks, although Pakistani officials claimed this was not the case and civilians including women and children had been targeted.

India’s army also claimed three civilians were killed in Pakistani shelling into Indian-controlled Kashmir after the vowed to launch retaliatory strikes. 

In an post on X overnight, the Indian army wrote that ‘Justice is Served’ and ‘Jai Hind!!’, which translates to ‘victory to India’. 

In the hours that followed, the Indian army said that Pakistan had ‘fired artillery’ across the dividing lines in Kashmir in retaliation, accusing it of violating a 2020 ceasefire agreement. 

‘Pakistan again violates the Ceasefire Agreement by firing Artillery in Bhimber Gali in Poonch- Rajauri area,’ on the Indian side, Indian army said in a post on X. 

The army ‘is responding appropriately in a calibrated manner,’ it added.

Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif condemned Wednesday’s airstrikes and said the ‘deceitful enemy has carried out cowardly attacks at five locations in Pakistan’ and that his country would retaliate.

‘Pakistan has every right to give a robust response to this act of war imposed by India, and a strong response is indeed being given,’ Sharif said.

Indian information ministry officials had planned several civil defence ‘mock drills’ to take place on Wednesday, ahead of its attacks earlier this morning.

‘The Ministry of Home Affairs has asked several states to conduct mock drills for effective civil defence’, Kanchan Gupta, a senior advisor from the information ministry, said in a statement earlier this week.

Gupta said this would involve rehearsing an ‘evacuation plan’ and the ‘training of civilians, students, etc., on the civil defence aspects to protect themselves in the event of a hostile attack’.

The strikes came amid soaring tensions between the nuclear-armed neighbors over last month’s militant attack on tourists in the Indian-controlled portion of Kashmir, which killed 26. 

India has blamed Pakistan for backing the bloody attack, which Islamabad has denied. 

The missiles struck locations in Pakistan-administered Kashmir and in the country’s eastern Punjab province early Wednesday.

CNN reported that five locations were struck. Three of those locations – Kotli, Muzaffarabad and Bagh are in Pakistan-administered Kashmir. 

One of them struck a mosque in the city of Bahawalpur in Punjab, where a child was killed, one official said. 

Pakistani officials confirmed that Pakistan had launched retaliatory strikes, without providing any details.

Three Indian jets and a drone have been shot down by Pakistan’s air force, the country’s Information Minister Tarar Attaullah said. 

Reacting to news of Indian strikes, he told BBC: ‘They have crossed out limits’. 

Separately, Pakistani military spokesperson Ahmed Sharif told BBC Pakistani forces are on the ground, but did not specify where.  

Multiple explosions were heard in the Pakistani Kashmir area close to of Muzaffarabad on Tuesday night, according to Reuters, with unverified footage on social media showing several loud explosions ringing in the city.

Resident Abdul Sammad said he heard several explosions and that some people were wounded in the attack. 

People were seen running in panic and authorities immediately cut the power, leading to a blackout.

Indian fighter jets could be heard flying over Srinagar, the capital of Indian Kashmir, according to unconfirmed reports. 

Loud explosions were also reportedly heard in the town of Poonch, only about 10 miles from the dividing line, as New Delhi accused Pakistan of firing shells across the Line of Control.

Sharif has convened a meeting of the National Security Committee for Wednesday morning.

Stephane Dujarric, the United Nations spokesperson, said in a statement late Tuesday that Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was ‘very concerned about the Indian military operations across the Line of Control and international border’ and called for maximum military restraint from both countries.

‘The world cannot afford a military confrontation between India and Pakistan,’ the statement read.

Commenting on the escalation from the Oval Office, US President Donald Trump told reporters: ‘We just heard about it as we were walking through the doors of the Oval…I guess people knew something was going to happen… They’ve been fighting for a long time… I just hope it ends very quickly.’

Meanwhile, a US state department spokesperson said that Washington was ‘closely monitoring developments’. 

In recent days, Washington had urged the nuclear-armed neighbours to work with each other to de-escalate tensions and arrive at a ‘responsible solution’. 

Indian airline Spice Jet has said that due to the ongoing situation, some airports in parts of northern India have closed. Qatar Airways has temporarily suspended flights to Pakistan. 

People in Pakistan have gathered overnight to protest against India’s strikes – with several heard chanting anti-Indian slogans and setting pictures of Indian PM Modi alight. 

The attack from the Indian government comes after it vowed to retaliate following the ‘barbaric’ attack in which dozens of Indians were killed in Kashmir last month. 

On April 22, gunmen burst out of forests at a popular tourist spot and opened fire on the crowds of visitors, killing 25 Indian residents and one person residing in Nepal.

The attack took place in Pahalgam, a picturesque town in the Himalayas often described as the ‘Switzerland of India’. 

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi responded furiously to the incident by pledging a ‘punishment bigger than they can imagine’ for the perpetrators. 

Tensions have been escalating massively between the two historical rivals since the tragedy, with fears that conflict could break out between the two nuclear-armed nations who have been bitter rivals since 1947, when the nations were split from British-controlled India.

The partition of the two nations established Pakistan as a Muslim-majority nation, while India was created as a Hindu-majority nation.

Britain’s decision, passed by parliament in July 1947, also gave Kashmir, as well as Jammu, the opportunity to decide which nation to join.

Kashmir’s monarch, the maharaja, initially decided that his nation should go it alone, claiming that it had been under the yoke of empires for centuries and had been ignored and under-developed.

But ultimately, the then-ruler of Kashmir agreed his nation should join India, in exchange for the former colony providing material support against Pakistan, which later triggered the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947-48.

Years of conflict led to rebels in Kashmir waging an insurgency that began in 1989, seeking independence or a merger with Pakistan.

New Delhi has regularly blamed Islamabad for backing gunmen in Kashmir, though Pakistan denies this.

The region is split between India and Pakistan and claimed by both in its entirety.