Former Chief of Defence Staff General Anil Chauhan on Tuesday said that India did not target Pakistan's Kirana Hills nuclear facility during last year's Operation Sindoor, but an Indian loitering ammunition inadvertently hit it.
Chauhan explained that a lot of loitering munitions were sent at Sargodha, which is just 10 km north of Kirana Hills. He said one of those munitions must have come and hit the Kirana Hills nuclear facility after not finding a target."Before those strikes, we had sent a lot of loiter ammunition at Sargodha, and Kirana Hills is 10 km north of Sargodha. So the loiter ammunition was looking for radars, which were in and around Sargodha, and it has got a lifetime. It will loiter for about two hours, and if it doesn't find a target, it will come and hit somewhere. It must have come and hit one of those hills,'' General Chauhan was quoted by ANI as saying.
The Kirana Hills is a vast rocky mountain range and a designated area under the Pakistan ministry of defence in Sargodha district. Locally referred to as the “Black Mountains” due to its brownish terrain, it stretches between the township of Rabwah and the city of Sargodha.
{{/usCountry}}The Kirana Hills is a vast rocky mountain range and a designated area under the Pakistan ministry of defence in Sargodha district. Locally referred to as the “Black Mountains” due to its brownish terrain, it stretches between the township of Rabwah and the city of Sargodha.
{{/usCountry}}Former Director General of Air Operations, Air Marshal AK Bharti, had said on May 12 last year that the Indian armed forces did not target the nuclear facility at Kirana Hills in Pakistan.
Responding to a query during a press conference at the time, Bharti said, “Thank you for telling us that Kirana Hills houses some nuclear installation. We did not know about it. And we have not hit Kirana Hills, whatever is there.”
What happened?
India had launched Operation Sindoor on May 7 2025, in response to the deadly terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir's Pahalgam region on April 22, that left 26 people dead. The operation, launched by the tri-services, targeted terror infrastructure located in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK). Over 100 terrorists were killed in these strikes, according to the government.
In the following days, the Indian armed forces hit back at Pakistan's attempted retaliatory strikes. On May 10, the Pakistani army reached out to its Indian counterpart, leading to a ceasefire understanding between the two neighbours.
Immediately after the operation, as well, heavy speculations and social media chatter had claimed that India had struck the Mushaf Airbase in Sargodha, reportedly linked to underground nuclear storage beneath the Kirana Hills. The Air Force denied targeting the facility, both then and now.