Three Lashkar-e-Toiba militants including a top commander of the outfit were killed in a gunfight with forces in Binner village of northern Baramulla district on Wednesday.
The slain militants have been identified as Suhaib Akhoon of Khanpora (Baramulla), Mohsin Mushtaq and Nasir Ahmad Darzi, both residents of old town Baramulla, and were affiliated with LeT for the past many years, a police official said.
He said that following “inputs” about the presence of militants on the outskirts of Binner village, a joint party of the Jammu and Kashmir police and other security forces cordoned off the area last night and launched a search operation there on Wednesday morning.
“As the forces approached towards a militant hideout, the hiding militants fired a volley of bullets, triggering a gunfight which lasted for some time. During the encounter, three militants were killed,” the police said.
The slain militants were given an opportunity to surrender but they declined the offer and instead resorted to heavy firing on forces, said senior superintendent of police Baramulla Imtiyaz Hussain.
Meanwhile, following the killing of three militants, the mobile internet service was snapped in Baramulla town and its adjoining villages. Soon after the gunfight started, clashes between youth and forces broke out in Binner.
The police lobbed scores of teargas shells to disperse the protesting youths.
The clashes continued in the area until late in the evening.
Suhaib, a commander of the outfit, is the third militant from Khanpora area of Baramulla town killed in a gunfight with forces since August 2017. Earlier, Javed Ahmad Dar, a militant from the same area, was killed along with his two associates in a gunfight at Amargarh area of Sopore, in August 2017.
Akeel Ahmad Sofi, another militant from Khanpora, was killed during a gunfight with forces in October 2018 at Athoora Kreeri. Akeel was a close friend of Suhaib.
The slain militants had given tough time to forces in the past and managed to escape on several occasions during cordons and search operations, a source said.
The source that unlike militants in southern Kashmir, “they remained away from social networking sites”.
Meanwhile, hundreds of people had gathered at Khanpora and old town areas—the native places of slain militants—and were waiting for the bodies, which, however, were not handed over to the families till late evening.
Meanwhile, a police spokesman in a statement confirmed the identity and affiliation of the slain militants.
“The slain militants were affiliated with LeT and were wanted by the law for their complicity in a series of crimes including attacks on security establishments and civilian atrocities,” the statement read.
These militants were active in Baramulla and Sopore areas.
“The slain militants were involved in the killing of three young boys in Baramulla in April 2018 for which a case vide FIR number 74 of 2018, under section 302 of RPC, 7/27 of the Arms Act, is under investigation at the police station Baramulla,” the statement read.
“In the aforementioned case, one militant Ajaz Ahmad Gojri son of Abdul Rehman of Jamia Mohalla Baramulla, who was part of the group involved in the killing of above-mentioned three youth, has been arrested earlier.”
The police also alleged that slain militants were involved in “conspiring and executing several attacks on security establishments in the area, including grenade attacks on the police station Baramulla on 2/12/2017 and 2/01/2018”.
“Arms and ammunition including three AK-47 rifles were recovered from the site of encounter. All these materials have been taken in case records for further investigation and probe their complicity in other cases,” the statement read.
Meanwhile, the police have appealed to the people not to venture inside the encounter zone “since such an area can prove dangerous due to stray explosive materials”.