MHA asks several states to conduct mock drills to prepare for any attack

New Delhi: The Union Home Ministry has asked several states to conduct mock drills on May 7 amid rising tensions with Pakistan following the Pahalgam terror attack, government sources said on Monday.

The measures to be taken during the drill include operationalisation of air raid warning sirens and training of civilians on civil defence aspects to protect themselves in the event of a "hostile attack", they said.

The other measures are provisions of crash blackout measures, early camouflaging of vital plants and installations and updation of evacuation plans and their rehearsal.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been holding a series of high-level meetings, including with top defence functionaries, as India weighs its options for countermeasures against the April 22 terror attack which left 26 civilians, mostly tourists, dead.

Modi has vowed to pursue the perpetrators and those part of the conspiracy to the "ends of the earth" to inflict punishment on them "beyond their imagination".