‘I was blessed’: Bengaluru musician travels 61,000 km to meet families of 40 killed in Pulwama

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Updated: Feb 14, 2020 12:20 IST

Umesh Jadhav is a special guest at the wreath-laying ceremony at Central Reserve Police Force’s (CRPF’s) campus in Kashmir’s Lethpora on Friday to mark a year of Pulwama attack.

The Bengaluru-based musician travelled more than 61,000km across the country to meet families of the 40 troopers, who lost their lives in the Pulwama attack last year.

The 40 men were killed after a Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) terrorist rammed a vehicle carrying explosives into their convoy of 78 buses on Srinagar-Jammu national highway on February 14, 2019.

Jadhav met the families of the CRPF personnel to collect soils from their homes, which has been placed at the memorial at CRPF’s Lethpora camp.

“I am proud that I met all the families of Pulwama martyrs and sought their blessings. Parents lost their son, wives lost their husbands, children lost their fathers, friends lost their friends,” Umesh Jadhav was quoted as saying by news agency ANI.

“I collected soil from their houses and their cremation grounds,” Jadhav added.

Jadhav was at the memorial which was inaugurated at the Lethpora camp on Friday and handed over the urn with the soil to CRPF’s additional director general Zulfiquar Hasan.

“Investigation is being done by the National Investigation Agency (NIA). It is proceeding in the right direction. As far as I know, they have made huge progress. We’ve tried our best to take care of martyrs’ families,” Hasan said, according to ANI.

The names of all the 40 personnel are part of the memorial near the place where Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorist Adeel Ahmed Dar, driving an explosive-laden car, blew himself next to a convoy.

Reports said Jadhav, the 40-year-old pharmacist-turned-musician, began his journey to meet the families of the Pulwama martyrs after he saw the news of the attack being flashed at the airport in Rajasthan’s Ajmer.

Almost all the conspirators behind the Pulwama attack have since been killed. Qari Yasir, the self-styled Kashmir chief of Jaish-e-Mohammad, was killed last month.

NIA has filed a supplementary chargesheet against four Jaish-e-Mohammad operatives including Sajjad Ahmad Khan, who was in direct touch with last year’s Pulwama attack mastermind Mudassir Khan, who is now dead.

Others charged under terror charges by NIA on February 12 include Bilal Ahmad Mir, Ishfaq Ahmad Bhat and Mehraj-ud-Din Chopan.