Srinagar: The bodies of the two soldiers missing in the Kokernag forests in south Kashmir’s Anantnag district since Monday have been recovered. While one body was found on Thursday, the second was recovered a day later.
While the exact cause of their deaths will only be known after autopsies are conducted, it is being suspected that the two elite paratroopers from the 5 Para SF unit died of hypothermia after being exposed to extreme cold.
According to officials, the bodies of the soldiers were found inside the dense forests of Gadole in Kokernag. Their backpacks and service weapons were found near them. The paratroopers’ identities have not yet been revealed.
“On the intervening night of 6/7 October an operational team on Kishtwar range confronted a severe snow storm and white out conditions in the mountains of South Kashmir. Since then, two soldiers have gone out of communication,” the Army’s Srinagar-based 15 Corps wrote on X.
It is believed that the two men strayed amid worsening weather in the mountain range running from Anantnag to Kishtwar in the Jammu region. Preliminary assessments point to an avalanche or snowstorm as the cause.
On Monday, the Army lost communication with its two elite para commandos, who were on a combing operation.
The Gadole forests have seen the presence of militants in the past. In 2023, Colonel Manpreet Singh, Major Ashish Donchak, and deputy superintendent of police Humayun Muzamil were killed in a gunfight in the forests.
Security agencies say that these forests are the hotbed of terrorist activity with foreign terrorists belonging to the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed setting up bases there.
Monday’s cordon and search operation was launched after receiving information of the movement of terrorists in the Gadole forests.
The security forces had not anticipated such heavy snowfall though.Temperatures in the area have plummeted by 10 degrees since Monday with many parts remaining under several feet of snow.
