Army man, militant killed in Baramulla

Majid Jahangir

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, September 2

A soldier of the Army’s elite counter insurgency unit and a top militant of the newly formed Lashkar-e-Islam (LeI), which carried out attacks on the telecom infrastructure in May and June this year, was killed and two jawans were injured in an eight-hour firefight in north Kashmir on Wednesday. 

A sepoy of the 32 Rashtriya Rifles,  Sishar Malla of Dehradun, was killed during the gunfight after the security forces launched an assault this afternoon to storm the two-storied house in a congested village, where militant Reyaz Ahmed Bhat, alias Rizwan, 25, of Brahat Kalan in Sopore was hiding and giving a tough fight. Rizwan was killed after the house was blasted by the security forces. 

The police said the gunfight erupted this morning in the Ladoora apple belt of Rafiabad in Baramulla district, 55 km from here, when the Special Operations Group of the J&K Police and the 32 Rashtriya Rifles launched a search operation following a tip-off about the presence of a militant in the area.

“As the joint teams of the police and the Army launched search operation, the trapped militant fired at the security forces triggering an encounter,” said Deputy Inspector General of Police, north Kashmir, Gareeb Das. “In the firefight, a militant associated with Lashkar-e-Islam was killed and we also lost a jawan,” he added. 

Sources said two Army men also received minor injuries in the gunfight.

The security forces had a tough time flushing out the lone militant from the two-storied house and the militant managed to engage the security men for nearly eight hours.

“We had to evacuate the inhabitants from the house, where the militant was hiding and we went slowly to ensure that there was no civilian causality,” said an Army officer in north Kashmir. He said the Army jawan who was killed in the gunfight was hit by the bullet on the forehead. An AK-47 rifle and some ammunition were also recovered from the encounter site.

The Lashkar-e-Islam, which is led by one of the most wanted militants in Kashmir Abdul Qayoom Najar, is a breakaway faction of the Hizbul Mujahideen. Police sources said Rizwan was number three in the hierarchy after Najar and Imtiyaz Qandoo. Both Najar and Imtiyaz carry an award of Rs 10 lakh each. The LeI carried 

out a series of attacks on telecom infrastructure in north Kashmir.

The police said Rizwan had joined militancy in April 2014 and was involved in various violent incidents, including killing of civilians in Sopore in June this year.

This was the second encounter in Rafiabad in the past one week. On August 26, three Pakistani militants were killed and one Pakistani intruder was captured in the Rafiabad forest. 

Another gunfight erupts in Handwara 

Hours after the Rafiabad gunfight ended, another firefight started in the Handwara forests of Kupwara district. Sources said the encounter broke  out in Sochalwari Vilgam village in Handwara around 8 pm on Wednesday. There are no reports of any casualty. The gunfight was on when the the reports last came in