Pakistan chopper strays across LoC, Indian forces almost shoot it down

NEW DELHI: Indian military forces came close to shooting down a Pakistani helicopter, which was ostensibly carrying Pakistan-occupied Kashmir PM Raja Farooq Haidar, after it strayed across the Line of Control in the Poonch sector of J&K on Sunday afternoon.

Defence sources said the Pakistani civilian helicopter violated Indian airspace for two-three minutes, which led to Indian Army troops on the ground opening fire as well as two IAF fighters being scrambled, in the Gulpur sector at 12.10 pm. The helicopter, painted white with blue stripes, then flew back to the Kahuta area in PoK.

“The chopper was flying quite high when it was spotted by our air sentries deployed at forward posts, who opened fire with small arms (light machine guns), and it turned back almost immediately. There were some reports from Pakistan that said the PoK PM was travelling in the chopper but we cannot confirm it,” a source said.

Sources said while no heavy calibre anti-aircraft weapons were used by Indian forces, two fighters were scrambled in a precautionary move. The airspace violation comes amid renewed firing duels between the two armies along the 778-km long LoC after three months of relative calm following the DGMOs from the two sides agreeing to “fully implement the 2003 ceasefire understanding in letter and spirit” on May 29.

In just the first five months of this year, ceasefire violations broke all annual records in the last 15 years, with the two armies regularly using light artillery guns, anti-tank guided missiles and heavy mortars to target each other and civilians being often caught in the middle, as was reported by TOI.

In February, a Pakistani military Mi-17 helicopter had flown dangerously close to the LoC in the same Gulpur sector, breaching the bilateral agreement inked in 1991 that ‘rotary-wing aircraft’ will not fly within 1 km and ‘fixed-wing aircraft’ (fighters, bombers and reconnaissance planes) within 10 km of each other’s airspace.

The 1991 pact ensures there is a buffer zone on both sides of the LoC to prevent accidental escalation of hostilities. Though aircraft and helicopters do sometimes inadvertently stray across the unresolved LoC, it is also quite common for both the air forces to fly close to each other’s territory to ‘probe’ the rival’s air defence measures as well as the ‘reaction time’ needed for them to kick in. The two sides also regularly fly surveillance drones along the LoC, some of which end up being shot down.