Tales of terror, courage, and humanity -- a father's desperate escape, a mother's sacrifice, and Kashmiris who saved lives.
On April 22, 2025, at Pahalgam's Point Zero -- the postcard-perfect meadow known as 'Mini Switzerland' -- a day filled with photography, laughter, and horse rides turned into a living nightmare.
Arvind S Agrawal, a Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha functionary from Chhattisgarh's Chirimiri town, had come to Kashmir with friends, his wife, and their four-and-a-half-year-old daughter. But when gunfire cracked through the calm, bodies fell, children screamed, and men in army fatigues issued deadly commands.
In the chaos, Arvind's daughter ran toward a swing, his wife vanished, and terror took hold. What followed was not just an escape but a testament to human courage -- a gold ring exchanged for safe passage, a Kashmiri brother claiming a child as his own, and locals risking their lives for strangers.
Amid the terror, what shone through was love, bravery, and an unforgettable bond that defied violence. This is Arvind's soul-stirring story of survival -- and hope.
This is the story of India.
'We were doing a couple shoot. Suddenly, it sounded like firecrackers'
"We had come from Chhattisgarh. We've been visiting for 18 years. The attack happened on a Tuesday (April 22), but we had reached Pahalgam a day before, on Monday (April 21). The next morning, around 10-11 am, we started walking towards Point Zero," says Arvind.
Because of heavy rains, vehicles couldn't go beyond a point. "We had to go by horse. It was steep and slippery. Some turned back. But we went ahead."
Once at Point Zero, everything seemed peaceful. "We were doing photography. My cousins and I had booked four cameras for our couple shoots." The cameraman soon moved them to a quieter corner due to the crowds.
Then came the first bang. "It felt like someone was celebrating. Firecrackers, I thought." But the illusion shattered in seconds.
"My daughter ran ahead saying, 'Look, there's a swing!' It was in the centre of the ground. She walked toward it."
Then came the second round of bangs. "This time I saw two people fall. I told the photographer, 'Bhaiya (brother), this is a terrorist attack!'
"I had never seen or heard anything like this in my 35 years," the photographer, a local, told Arvind.
People were running chaotically, says Arvind. "Someone nearby got shot. We hid behind a mound of dirt, like a broken bunker."
'They shouted, 'Get down!' We thought they were the army'
Arvind's wife and daughter were still on the ground. "Men in military uniforms shouted, 'Get down!' My wife thought they were police or army, so she lay down calmly," Arvind says recounting what his wife told him a day later when all of them were away from harm.
He adds, "There were around 500 tourists – many couples like us with their families, old people -- and locals and horsemen who helped us."
Arvind was desperate to find his wife. "I was shouting, showing my jacket to my wife to draw her attention and run towards us. One of my friend's wives pulled me out of the area. We crossed the fencing and ran."
The run, through mountains and forests, took almost two hours. "I was trying to call the emergency number but couldn't remember it. I finally dialled 100. Someone at a call centre picked up."
'I saw my daughter walking alone toward the hospital'
"I saw a small girl walking towards the hospital where I was being treated. My heart stopped -- it was my daughter. Then I saw my wife -- but I didn't recognise her. Her clothes were torn. Someone had given her a Kashmiri kurta to wear."
That someone? A complete stranger, a local man who didn't want a woman to feel exposed after escaping bullets as my wife had torn her clothes in the melee.
Arvind pauses here, long. "There's good in this world. You see it clearly when everything else is dark."
'They asked, 'Whose daughter is this?' Nazakat Bhai said, 'She's mine''
His wife later shared the harrowing details. "When the terrorists reached the area, they told everyone to lie down. Then to kneel. Then they were asked to recite religious phrases -- the kalma and all. It seemed like a test."
"She lay quietly. A man near my daughter got hit in the head. Blood splattered. My wife covered her face, lay still with her head down."
Then came the moment that saved their child.
"One terrorist pointed a gun at our friend Nazakat Bhai and asked, 'Whose daughter is this?' He said, 'She's mine.' 'How many kids do you have?' 'Two, both are mine,'" Nazakat told the terrorist. The second child was the son of Arvind's cousin. "If it had not been for Nazakat Bhai's bravery and presence of mind I don't know what those terrorists would have done to my daughter and wife," says Arvind.
Something distracted the terrorists just then. "Our relatives -- my brother and nephew -- grabbed the kids and my wife and ran. They had to jump a six-foot fence too."
That's when his wife's hand got fractured.
'People began clicking pictures because her clothes were torn'
"When she came to me, she didn't say much. She just said, 'Let's get out of here.' We left everything behind. We reached Srinagar, stayed at an army guest house for two days."
It was only later she shared more. "She said while trying to escape, people started taking photos because her clothes had torn. Our daughter was with her, and people began clicking pictures."
It was a Kashmiri horseman who helped her get to safety and offered her a Kashmiri kurta, Arvind's wife told him.
'She offered him her gold ring. He said, 'Sister, why are you doing this?''
"The forest people had surrounded her. A horseman showed her a road nearby. That road led to a village near Pahalgam."
"She offered him her gold ring and said, 'Brother, please get me there safely.' He felt ashamed. He took the ring and safely dropped her."
'You are like my sister,' he told my wife.
"He told her, 'Sister, don't embarrass me by offering this. I didn't do it for money. We are humans and that's what we do when faced with danger. I would do the same if my sister were in your place and I am sure if such danger were to befall my sister any Indian would also do the same.'"
This act of humanity stayed with Arvind.
'My daughter hid her face in my jacket when she saw the police'
His daughter, though safe, was deeply shaken. "At the Srinagar airport on April 24 when they were heading back home, when she saw the police, she hid her face in my jacket. Her body still has marks and scratches."
"'They are wearing military uniforms,' my daughter told me. The trauma of the attack created a fear for uniforms for her," says Arvind.
Though Arvind didn't witness teh killings up close, he saw people fall. "About 200-300 meters away. That's when I knew bullets were being fired."
He kept praying at the hospital. "God, please bring Pooja back. That's all I could say."
'Kashmiris treated us with kindness'
Despite the terror and chaos, Arvind refuses to paint everyone with one brush. "The local Kashmiris we met -- regardless of their religion -- treated us well. Their behaviour, their way of speaking -- it was all very kind."
Nazakat, the man who claimed Arvind's daughter as his own, had known Arvind's family for years. "They've been coming to my hometown to sell clothes for 30 years. We met them properly in Jammu, when they came to pick us up from Jammu on the 18th."
When they met at the airport after the attack, "He hugged me at the airport security line."
'They were speaking in Hindi. My wife said they asked people to read something'
When asked if the terrorists said anything specific to his wife and daughter, he said, "They didn't say they were only killing men. They were speaking in Hindi. My wife said they were telling people to read something -- possibly from a religious text."
His wife never saw their faces clearly. "Just glimpses -- their clothes. When you're terrified, you try not to make eye contact."
His wife, however, firmly told him that none of the terrorists who killed people in her presence asked anybody to identify their religion or asked the males who they killed to drop their pants to separate the non-Muslims.
"Everyone lived because of courage. And because someone lied to save a child," says Arvind as he and his family reach Delhi on their way to Chhattisgarh.
© 2025