Kargil Vijay Diwas 2024

*Kargil Vijay Diwas 2024*

- *Date and Time*: Kargil Vijay Diwas is celebrated every year on July 26th, marking the anniversary of India's victory in the Kargil War in 1999.

- *History*: The Kargil War was a conflict between India and Pakistan that took place in the Kargil district of Jammu and Kashmir from May to July 1999.

After the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, there had been a long period of relatively few direct armed conflicts involving the military forces of the two neighbours – not withstanding the efforts of both nations to control the Siachen Glacier by establishing military outposts on the surrounding mountains ridges and the resulting military skirmishes in the 1980s. During the 1990s, however, escalating tension and conflict due to separatist activities in Kashmir, as well as the conducting of nuclear tests by both countries in 1998, led to an increasingly belligerent atmosphere.[7]

In this situation, both countries signed the Lahore Declaration in February 1999, promising to provide a peaceful and bilateral solution to the Kashmir conflict. During the winter of 1998–1999, some elements of the Pakistani Armed Forces were covertly training and sending Pakistani troops and paramilitary forces, into territory on the Indian side of the line of control (LOC). The infiltration was code-named "Operation Badri". The aim of the Pakistani incursion was to sever the link between Kashmir and Ladakh and cause Indian forces to withdraw from the Siachen Glacier, thus forcing India to negotiate a settlement of the broader Kashmir dispute. Pakistan also believed that any tension in the region would internationalize the Kashmir issue, helping it to secure a speedy resolution. Yet another goal may have been to boost the morale of the decade-long rebellion in the Indian State of Kashmir by taking a proactive role.[8]

Initially, with little knowledge of the nature and extent of the infiltration, the Indian troops in the area assumed that the infiltrators were jihadis and declared that they would evict them within a few days. The subsequent discovery of infiltration elsewhere along the LOC, along with the difference in tactics employed by the infiltrators, caused the Indian army to realize that the plan of attack was on a much bigger scale. The total area seized by the ingress is generally accepted to between 130 km2 – 200 km2. The Government of India responded with Operation Vijay, a mobilization of 200,000 Indian troops. The war came to an official end on July 26, 1999, with the eviction of Pakistan Army troops from their occupied positions, thus marking it as Kargil Vijay Diwas. 527 soldiers from the Indian Armed Forces lost their lives during the war.

- *Significance*: Kargil Vijay Diwas is a day to honor the bravery and sacrifice of Indian soldiers who fought valiantly during the Kargil War ¹ ² ³ ⁴. It symbolizes national pride, unity, and the spirit of the Indian people and the Armed Forces ¹ ² ³ ⁴.

- *Celebrations*: Various events and parades are organized to honor the soldiers who fought in the Kargil War ². The main ceremony takes place at the Kargil War Memorial in Drass, where dignitaries pay homage to the martyrs ².

- *25th Anniversary*: In 2024, Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited Drass in Ladakh to commemorate the 25th anniversary of Kargil Vijay Diwas ¹ ³. The Indian Air Force also celebrated 'Kargil Vijay Diwas Rajat Jayanti' at Air Force Station Sarsawa from July 12 to July 26, 2024

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