New Delhi: A few days before Bharat Bhushan was to leave on a vacation with his wife and three-year-old son, his elderly mother was hesitant. She felt uneasy. “Why can’t you go anywhere else?” she sat him down, and asked with a heavy heart. “Somewhere, where it is safe.”
Bharat laughed it off. “India has changed. Kashmir is India’s Switzerland. Don’t worry.”
A year has passed since that conversation. The elderly mother hasn’t had a conversation with her son since. She will never have one.
“Preetham, Bharat has been shot three times in the forehead…I saw it with my own eyes. They were terrorists,” Bharat’s elder brother recalls Sujatha, Bharat’s wife, telling him on a frantic call from Pahalgam on 22 April 2025.
“When the terrorists put a gun to his head, all Bharat could tell them was—please leave us, this is a small child,” Sujatha later told Preetham. By the time the 25-30 minutes of mayhem at the Biasaran valley ended, 26 lives had been destroyed.
The terrorists killed 25 Indians—24 tourists and a Kashmiri local—and one Nepalese tourist before disappearing into the surrounding jungles. Eyewitness accounts indicate victims were singled out based on religion and shot at close range in front of their families.
Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) offshoot The Resistance Front (TRF) claimed responsibility for the attack, before withdrawing the claim. The Cabinet Committee of Security chaired by PM Modi met the day after the attack and in a statement highlighted a potential link to Pakistan, saying “cross-border linkages of the terrorist attack were brought out” in a briefing. India responded to the attack with Operation Sindoor, targeting terrorists and terror infrastructure across the border in precision military strikes.
As for Preetham, the call he received that day would change their lives irreversibly. As panic gave way to confirmation, fragments of what had happened in Pahalgam began to surface. A year on, those moments remain frozen in time for the family, shaping how they remember Bharat and how they have created an “artificial normalcy” without him.
The last holiday
Kashmir was Bharat’s dream destination. “He knew he wanted to go to Kashmir one day,” Preetham told ThePrint.
Bharat left for Kashmir on 18 April 2025. He sent a selfie of himself smiling from the flight to the family back home. “It’s beautiful here. Next time, you can take your family out for a vacation…” Preetham recalled their phone call from 20 April.
Pahalgam was supposed to be their last stop. They reached the Baisaran Valley on a pony. It was a beautiful day. The sun was out. They tried out Kashmiri costumes, clicked photographs in the wide open meadow, and played with their son.
And then suddenly, they heard gunshots.
The attack began sometime after 2.30 pm. Men, armed with guns, barged into the meadow from the jungle surrounding it and began shooting people. The tourists and locals ran for cover. There could be none. They were caught in the middle of the large green space, with nowhere to hide.
Some saw tents as cover. Bharat hid behind one such structure with Sujatha and their son. They could see what was unfolding. Men among the tourists were pulled up, questioned about their religion, and shot at point-blank range.
Bharat and his wife prayed the gunmen would miss them. But that afternoon, under the open sky, there was nowhere to hide. No prayer was answered, no plea heeded.
“I have a small child, please leave us,” he told the terrorists, according to his wife. Seconds later, Bharat lay motionless inches away from his wife and their son.
Twelve months since that fateful day, dust has settled over the meadows of Pahalgam, but for the families of the 26 victims, the trauma never goes away. Every time the police or the government make a statement on those deadly attacks, reels are pushed on social media, or when Operation Sindoor finds a mention in any political rally, the pain revisits them.
For Bhushan’s family, they are navigating their life and slowly returning to the “artificial normalcy.” Sujatha hopes to return to the clinic she planned to set up with her husband.
Her son now goes to school.
‘Why go to Switzerland when we have our own’
There was a gap of just four years in their ages. But Preetham (39) and Bharat (35) were worlds apart as personalities.
Preetham was loud and social. Bharat was calm, quiet, and clear about what he wanted.
Their father was a Karnataka government officer and the family lived in and around Bengaluru when they were growing up. Preetham said Bharat quit his 15-year IT career at Infosys to help his wife, Sujatha, run her medical clinic.
Before starting the new business, he wanted to take a break.
“When Bharat told our mom about the Kashmir trip, she asked him if it would be safe, but Bharat laughed it off. ‘Why go to Switzerland when we have our own,’ he asked,” Preetham told ThePrint.
“None of us cries. We can’t afford to break down. We know we are fragile, and we pretend to have a normal life. Life feels artificial,” Preetham said, his voice choking. “We have learnt to take it one day at a time. Life has to move on. We have to take care of each other.”
(Edited by Ajeet Tiwari)
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