M A I N   N E W S

Cop running militant group in J&K arrested
Two-member gang carried out 13 attacks in Srinagar in 18 months
Azhar Qadri/TNS

Srinagar, August 21
The Jammu and Kashmir Police has arrested two persons allegedly involved in 13 deadly attacks, including an assassination attempt on a cabinet minister and an attack on the civil secretariat, in the capital city over the past 18 months.

The duo was operating under the outfit name Islamic Movement of Kashmir, said Inspector General of Police (Kashmir zone) SM Sahai. He identified the two persons as police constable Abdul Rashid Shigan, alias Molvi, alias Omer Mukhtar, and released militant Imtiyaz Ahmad Gojri, alias Amir. Both are residents of Srinagar city.

Shigan, a constable with the Jammu and Kashmir Armed Police since 1998 and over-ground worker (OGW) for the Harkat-ul-Mujahideen during his student years, was the mastermind of the squad. He had stockpiled rifles and ammunition at a hideout built in his house.

Two AK-47 rifles, a Krinkov assault rifle, four pistols, five grenades, 12 under-barrel grenade launcher shells, one improvised explosive device, a mine and other ammunition were seized from the hideout, the police said.

Sahai said the arrested militants had accepted their involvement in 13 attacks carried out in the city since January last year.

Shigan and Gojri assassinated retired DSP Abdul Hameed Bhat earlier this month while he was leaving a mosque near his house on the outskirts of the city. In December last year, they carried out an attack on state Law Minister Ali Mohammad in Srinagar’s old city. Though the minister survived the attack, one policeman was killed in the incident. The Kashmir police chief said the duo was able to go undetected for the past 18 months because they were not part of any militant group. “Leads (and inputs) would always come from structured set-up. They were working in isolation,” Sahai said.

This is for the second time this year that the state police has found its own men involved in militant attacks or abetting the militant cause.

Four policemen were arrested in June this year for aiding militants in Kashmir.

MAJOR ATTACKS

August 10, 2012: Retired DSP Abdul Hameed Bhat shot dead outside a mosque

July 18: Civil secretariat attacked with rifle grenade

June 28: Rifle grenades fired at Tatoo group Territorial Army camp

May 30: CRPF patrol attacked, seven injured

April 20: ASI Sukhpal Singh shot dead in a market

December 11, 2011: Law Minister Ali Mohammad Sagar attacked

June 29, 2011: Inspector Shabir Ahmad shot dead

January 4, 2011: Injured SHO Batamaloo Nazir Ahmad