Shishir Gupta, executive editor of Hindustan Times, and senior anchor Ayesha Varma discuss the Pahalgam terror attack and its broader geopolitical ramifications. During the conversation, they look back at the carnage, question Pakistan’s terror ecosystem, and ask what India must do to prevent another such tragedy.
A massacre disfigured Pahalgam
One year ago, 26 Hindu tourists were targeted and shot dead by LeT terrorists in the Baisaran Valley near Pahalgam, in one of the most brutal sectarian massacres in recent years. The attackers identified Hindu men and shot them in front of their families, turning the holiday into a horror scene.
Gupta describes the “cost of terrorism” as high: the loss of lives, the destruction of families, and a country having to confront the failure of its security infrastructure in the face of a “rogue state” on India’s western border. In hindsight, he says, every link in the security chain — from intelligence to local police response — was found to be deficient.
Three members of the Lashkar-e-Taiba, working under the facade of the “Resistance Front,” carried out the Pahalm attack. The three – Faisal Jat, Hamza Afghan and Gibran – were Pakistani nationals who had infiltrated through the Gurez-Tolai sector of north Kashmir between 2022 and 2023. Gupta points out that Faisal Jat was a former commando officer in the Pakistan Army, armed with an AK-103 rifle, while the group also carried an M4/M9 rifle, GPS devices, satellite phones and HF radios for survival. In constant contact with dealers across the Line of Control.
The trio struck on April 22 and managed to survive for more than three months in the icy upper reaches of the valley, before being neutralized on July 28, 2025 in the Harawan Forest near Dachigam National Park. For Gupta, that long gap between attack and elimination is itself an indictment of the regime.
Where India’s security network failed
Gupta lays out the ideal defense chain in four stages: better intelligence for proactiveness, strong enforcement for prevention, strong tactical capability for rapid reaction, and finally investigation. It is believed that the sequence at Pahalgam collapsed at multiple points.
He refers first to the local police. The Jammu and Kashmir police station in charge of the area was only six kilometers away, but the response on the ground was late and inadequate, even though this area is familiar to the security forces. Counterinsurgency responsibilities in the belt were shared between the CRPF and the Rashtriya Rifles, while the Army guarded the Line of Control to prevent infiltration, but the regime failed to translate this deployment into a real-time response when it mattered.
Gupta explains that the political leadership since 2014 – appointing Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Defense Minister Rajnath Singh, and Home Minister Amit Shah – has been willing to empower the security forces and give them the required capabilities. The problem, he says, lies with “institutional leadership” within the security network, which must now be held accountable if it fails to anticipate, prevent or respond to such threats quickly.
Gupta points out that everyone in Srinagar was aware of the presence of terrorists infiltrating the valley, with estimates indicating the presence of between 60 to 70 such fighters at the time. This prior awareness makes the failure to anticipate an attack that would cause mass casualties on Hindu tourist targets more apparent, in his assessment.
Assem Mounir: “The arsonist” as a mediator
The Pahalgam massacre occurred days after Pakistan’s then army chief, General Asim Munir, delivered an anti-Hindu hate speech on April 16, a connection that Gupta sees as more than just a coincidence. Today, Mounir has been promoted to field marshal, and US President Donald Trump has publicly praised him as an “honest broker” between Washington and Tehran.
Gupta is scathing about this image change. In his opinion, “only his rank changed, and the man remained the same.” He claims that Pakistan long ago mastered the art of playing arsonist and firefighter at the same time: The same army that offers to mediate between the United States and Iran is accused of supporting the Sunni group Jaish al-Adl to attack Iran’s Sistan province, which prompted Iran to retaliate by launching ballistic missiles into Balochistan.
He points out that this duality has a long history. He recalls how Pakistan allowed US U-2 spy planes to operate from its territory in the 1950s, supported Washington during the 1971 Bangladesh liberation war, and then played sides with the Taliban and the United States after 9/11. At each stage, Islamabad extracted strategic rents while nurturing jihadist proxies, and Gupta believes Munir is now trying to make similar “deals” in a new era.
The Jihad Factory in Pakistan is “alive and vibrant”
When asked whether groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba and JeM are still thriving, Gupta’s answer was blunt: Pakistan’s terrorist establishment is “alive and vibrant.” The LeT remains active primarily against India, while the Jaish-e-Islam continues to operate from Bahawalpur; Both are Pakistani Punjabi-based groups focused on targeting India, especially Jammu and Kashmir.
Beyond these India-based groups, Gupta charts a broader ecosystem of Pakistani groups targeting Afghanistan, Iran, and the United States, describing Pakistan as a “global jihad factory.” He says cosmetic narratives of mediation or moderation cannot hide the fact that “terror factories are alive and kicking” and will inevitably emerge in new attacks when the ISI chooses to unleash them.
The illusion of the second path and a “changing” Pakistan
In this context, Gupta strongly questions the periodic hype surrounding Track II dialogues between India and Pakistan. He dismisses them as “trips” for retired bureaucrats and military officers whose official terms have expired, with little real impact unless directly empowered by the political leadership.
He reminds viewers that Modi himself embarked on a dramatic political adventure when he landed in Lahore on December 25, 2015 to meet then Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, only to be rewarded days later with the JeM attack on the Pathankot airbase. He points out that the expectation that the talks will lead to a radical transformation in Pakistan is illusory.
Gupta compares the US openness to China in the 1970s under Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, which was driven by the hope that this engagement would push Beijing toward democracy. Half a century later, he says, American leaders acknowledge that this assumption failed as China emerged as a peer competitor. For him, the lesson is clear: deal with the “absolute facts” in Pakistan – where its leaders, both political and military, feed on anti-India rhetoric and an extremist society – rather than illusions about its imminent transformation.
United States, Pakistan, and India: a precise triangle
Does Munir’s equation with both Washington and Beijing mean that the United States will now be complacent regarding Pakistan’s terrorist record? Gupta expects Washington to retain a “soft corner” for Pakistan for transactional reasons. He points to cooperation on Iran, cryptocurrency channels, and announced side deals with figures like Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner as factors that could translate into IMF support, Gulf financing, or even military aid flowing to Islamabad.
However, at the same time, he stresses that US-India relations are “equally strong,” and that any perception that Trump is going easy on Pakistan after a major terrorist attack on India would damage bilateral relations with New Delhi. In other words, Washington’s balancing of opportunistic partnership with Pakistan and strategic embrace of India will only become more difficult if further Pahalgam-style atrocities occur.
Prevent the next pahalmin
In the final part, Varma brings the discussion back to the basic question: How can India prevent another Pahalgam? Gupta breaks the answer down into concrete steps.
First, stop infiltration across the Line of Control in Kashmir. He acknowledges the existence of contradiction Rees is an icy mountain, but he insists there can be “no excuses” given the army’s heavy deployment.
Second, strengthen the counter-insurgency network so that the CRPF and Rashtriya Rifles keep terrorists under constant pressure, forcing them to flee instead of sitting, planning and executing.
Third, significantly improve intelligence – both from Pakistan and inside Kashmir – to locate and neutralize terrorists before they strike.
Fourth, ensure robust ground response by Jammu and Kashmir Police, who are the real eyes and ears on the ground. Not only must they pass information up, they must also respond quickly, rather than letting attackers run free for hours.
Gupta warns against misplaced invocation of human rights when faced with terrorists who ask victims to lower their pants and kill them on the basis of purely religious identity. He says that in such circumstances, the state’s primary responsibility is to protect innocent people through “sustained pressure and proactive and preventive measures,” supported by strong institutional leadership across all security arms.
As the conversation winds down, Varma concludes Point Blank by remembering the 26 lives lost in the “horrific Pahalgam terrorist attack,” even as the discussion looks to the difficult choices that India and the world must make in dealing with Pakistan’s perpetual jihad project.
