India fire missile into Pakistan ‘accidentally’, Defence Ministry apologies

Written By : Aashish Vashistha

March 12, 2022 (New Delhi): On Friday this week, India fired a missile into Pakistan because of a “technical malfunction” during routine maintenance, giving its version of events after longtime enemy Pakistan warned the incident could have “unpleasant consequences.” Later on the same day, Pakistan’s foreign office said it had summoned India’s charge d’affaires in Islamabad to lodge a protest over what it called an accidental violation of its airspace.

Replying to this technical malfunctioning, Delhi’s Defence Ministry clarified that, “On 9 March 2022, in the course of a routine maintenance, a technical malfunction led to the accidental firing of a missile.” Ministry further added, “It is learnt that the missile landed in an area of Pakistan. While the incident is deeply regrettable, it is also a matter of relief that there has been no loss of life due to the accident.”

Pakistan also warned India earlier “to be mindful of the unpleasant consequences of such negligence and take effective measures to avoid the recurrence off such violations in future”. Military experts in the past warned of the risk of miscalculations or accidents by the neighbors, which have fought three wars and engaged in numerous military clashes, most recently in 2019 which saw the air forces of the two engage in combat. FYI, Both the nations have nuclear weapons.

Military spokesman of Pakistan, Major-General Babar Iftikhar said in a late evening that, “A high-speed flying object” crashed near its eastern city of Mian Channu and that originated from the northern Indian city of Sirsa, in Haryana state near New Delhi. “The flight path of this object endangered many national and international passenger flights as well as human life and property of ground,” Babar said. FYI, the object travelled at an altitude of 40,000 feet, at Mach 3, and flew 77 miles in Pakistani airspace before crashing.