In his clarification made during a talk on ‘Operation Sindoor and its Aftermath’ in New Delhi, Gen Chauhan (retd) also backed Air Marshal A K Bharti.
IMAGE: Former chief of defence staff Gen Anil Chauhan (retd) speaks on ‘Operation Sindoor and its Aftermath’ at Vivekananda International Foundation, in New Delhi, August 25, 2026. Photograph: ANI on X
Former chief of defence staff Gen Anil Chauhan (retd) on Tuesday said the Indian forces “did not target” Pakistan’s Kirana Hills, which reportedly has a nuclear facility, and that a lot of loitering munitions were sent at Sargodha, and one of those might have come down after losing its running capacity and hit a hill.
Key Points
- The loitering munition was searching for radars in and around Sargodha and had a loitering time of about two hours, after which it would descend and strike somewhere if it failed to find a target, the former CDS said.
- He said Air Marshal Bharti had then “rightly clarified that we did not target Kirana Hills”.
- India’s strikes during the military conflict hit an airbase in Sargodha, and there were reports that the base was linked to an underground nuclear storage facility in Kirana Hills.
In his clarification made during a talk on ‘Operation Sindoor and its Aftermath’ in New Delhi, Gen Chauhan (retd) also backed Air Marshal A K Bharti, who as then Director General of Air Operations (DGAO) of the IAF told reporters on May 12 last year, “We have not hit Kirana hills, whatever is there.”
Air Marshal Bharti, who on July 31 retired as the deputy chief of air staff, was then asked about social media rumours that India had hit a site called Kirana Hills that reportedly housed a nuclear storage facility during its counter-offensive.
India conducted Operation Sindoor against nine terror infrastructure sites in Pakistan and Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir (PoK) in May 2025, killing over 100 terrorists, to avenge the April 22 Pahalgam terror attack.
India’s strikes during the military conflict hit an airbase in Sargodha, and there were reports that the base was linked to an underground nuclear storage facility in Kirana Hills.
“There was a small episode about what Air Marshal Bharti was asked, the Kirana Hills episode. I think I’ll clarify this. On occasions, it’s been asked whether Kirana Hills were hit; that is where their (Pakistan’s) nuclear facilities are,” Gen Chauhan (retd) said. He said Air Marshal Bharti had then “rightly clarified that we did not target Kirana Hills”.
“I can, maybe give a kind of an explanation… Before those strikes, we had sent in a lot of loitering munitions to Sargodha, and Kirana Hills is about 10 km north of Sargodha. So the loitering munition is looking for radars which are in and around Sargodha, and it has a time span, which means it will loiter for about two hours, and once it does not find a target, it comes down and hits somewhere,” the former CDS said.
“It must have come and hit one of those hills. So that could be one of the reasons as to what people asked… Because Pakistani media also showed some images in which there was smoke coming out from Kirana Hills,” he added.
In his talk delivered at the event hosted by the Vivekananda International Foundation, Gen Chauhan (retd) also said that Operation Sindoor is “still ongoing”, though major parts of the operation have concluded.
