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`Mobilisation pressured Pak. to denounce jehad'

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI MAY 1. As many as 1,874 Army personnel were killed or wounded in combating militancy in Jammu and Kashmir and during the full mobilisation of troops against Pakistan in the western sector, the Government disclosed in Parliament.

Named "Operation Parakram", the mobilisation of troops in battle ready mode on the border with Pakistan began on December 19, 2001 and lasted till October 16, 2002. The terrorist attack on Parliament House on December 13, 2001 triggered the mobilisation, the Defence Minister, George Fernandes, said in the Rajya Sabha. The Government, however, declined to disclose the extra expenditure incurred on account of the mobilisation. The compensation of Rs. 300 crores paid to farmers whose land was occupied or mined was the only official acknowledgement of the extra expenditure incurred.

The Government claimed that the 10-month-long mobilisation exerted immense military pressure on Pakistan and forced its President, Pervez Musharraf, to denounce support to jehad through his speeches of January 12 and May 27, 2002. And last summer, infiltration fell by 53 per cent as compared to the figures of the corresponding period of the previous year.

The mobilisation also focussed the attention of the international community on Pakistan as a state sponsoring terrorism, thereby pressuring it to shun cross-border terrorism.

The experience gained during the mobilisation helped the three services to reassess and revalidate their operational plans and procedures.

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