Srinagar, Dec 20: Police has kept the heat on by killing 172 terrorists so far this year, crossing the last year’s mark of 171 terrorists killed, Additional Director General of Police (ADGP), Vijay Kumar said Tuesday.
He said that with the killing of three Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) terrorists in a morning gunfight in Shopian district of south Kashmir, the number of terrorists killed this year so far had reached 172, crossing last year’s number of 171 terrorist kills.
He said that two of the three terrorists were responsible for the killing of a Kashmiri Pandit and a labourer from Nepal.
Kumar said that early Tuesday morning, a joint team of J&K Police, Army and paramilitary forces cordoned off Munjh Marg village in Shopian after receiving inputs about the presence of terrorists in the area.
“Three terrorists linked with proscribed terror outfit LeT were killed,” ADGP Kashmir said in a tweet.
In a subsequent tweet, he said the Police have identified two of the slain terrorists, who are locals and belong to the Lashkar-e-Toiba.
“Among three neutralised local terrorists, two have been identified as Lateef Lone of Shopian involved in the killing of a Kashmiri Pandit Purana Krishna Bhat and Umer Nazir of Anantnag involved in the killing of Till Bahadur Thapa of Nepal,” Kumar said in another tweet.
Meanwhile, Police said that when the joint team of security forces was zeroing in on the target, the terrorists hiding in the area opened indiscriminate fire and tried to break the security cordon.
“The joint team retaliated, leading to a gunfight,” Police said. “The gunfight ended with the killing of three terrorists.”
Police said that they recovered an AK-47 rifle and 2 pistols from the slain terrorists.
In a statement issued here, Police said that acting on specific information regarding the presence of terrorists in Munj Marg area of Shopian, a joint Cordon and Search Operation (CASO) was launched by Police, Army (1RR) and CRPF (178 Bn) in the area.
“During the search operation, as the joint search party approached towards the suspected spot, the hiding terrorists fired indiscriminately at the joint search party which was retaliated effectively leading to a gunfight,” Police said. “In the ensuing gunfight, three local terrorists were killed and their bodies were retrieved from the site of gunfight. They have been identified as Muhammad Lateef Lone of Check Kachidoora Shopian, Umer Nazir Bhat of Check Ban Dialgam Anantnag, and Danish Hussain Kakroo of Old Town Baramulla.”
Police said that as per its records, “All the killed terrorists were categorised terrorists and involved in several terror crime cases including attacks on police and security forces, and civilian atrocities.”
“ADGP Kashmir congratulated the joint team of Police and security forces for conducting a successful operation without any collateral damage and termed the operation as a big success,” Police said. “He also said that all the terrorist modules involved in civilian killings in the last three years have been neutralised and there is only one left which will be neutralised soon.”