April 10, 1988
The memories of that horrific day are still alive. I was at university, located at the foothills of Margalla, behind the diplomatic enclave. Parents had gone to Faisalabad and my younger brother and two sisters were at home.
It was international law's course and suddenly the classroom's wooden door was flung open by a huge blast and then an endless mega fireworks rattled the capital. Nobody knew what was happening. Panic, fear and uncertainty gripped the campus. Rumours spread like an attack was going on Islamabad, a violent coup was taking place, or mutiny was taking place against late President General Ziaul Haq. Then started getting calls that missiles rain had started over Islamabad, rockets were hitting parliament and other key buildings.
When I reached home I found all doors unlocked and windows open and my brother and sisters missing. There were no mobile phones, even land lines so imagine my condition.
I was so worried for them. Our car was also missing. Anyhow I checked with neighbors, but no trace. Then rushed to market to make phone calls from a Public Call Office, phones were dead.
Came back home and saw my siblings coming towards home in our car. My brother told me that when explosions started at Ojhri Camp, a clandestine ammunition dump close to entrance to Islamabad, which stored Stinger missiles for Afghan jihad, they were terribly loud and a huge mushroom cloud hovered in the sky and he thought that the nuclear plant at Kahuta, just outside Islamabad, had exploded so he evacuated and drove towards Taxila to our uncle's house.
A missile had hit the boundary wall of a house in front of ours in G-10/1 sector. Fortunately it did not explode and stuck in the wall like an arrow. I saw missiles stuck in several building and apartments and trees burning till late evening. Next morning newspapers reported hundreds of people died and scores of school children went missing or were killed. Never got more info on the missing and dead.
The site now is a fortified complex of Inter-Services Intelligence.
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