Srinagar/Ajmer, February 7
The J&K Police today arrested a cable operator for allegedly issuing threats to members of the Valley’s first all-girl rock band ‘Pragaash’. The number of arrests in the case has now gone up to three. All accused are in police custody till February 15.

Those arrested are Tariq Majid Khan (23), a postgraduate from south Kashmir’s Anatnag district, Rameez Ahmad Shah, a class XII student from the Ganderbal area in central Kashmir, and Irshad Ahmad Chara, a graduate, from Batamaloo in Srinagar. “While Khan and Shah were arrested last night, Chara was arrested in a morning raid,” police said.

State Chief Minister Omar Abdullah today said the government would not spare those who issued threats to members of the girl band.

He, however, maintained there was no need for a legal action against Grand Mufti Bashiruddin Ahmad who issued fatwa terming singing as un-Islamic.

Abdullah, during a visit to the dargah of Sufi saint Khawaja Moinuddin Chisiti in Ajmer expressed happiness over the arrests made in connection to the case and said more arrests were likely.

He said some of those who issued threats had left the Valley and the police was trying to arrest them.Omar had earlier posted on a microblogging site that he was glad that the police in Kashmir had identified and arrested those who had issued online threats. “I’m told more arrests are possible,” he tweeted.

Police sources privy to the investigations said two more persons had been identified by a special investigation team of the J&K Police and raids were on to arrest them.

Those arrested, a officer said, had hosted over a dozen pages on the social networking site Facebook and were reportedly involved in threatening the girl band soon after its first live performance in December last year. The girl band comprising three class X students-Farah Deeba, Aneka Khalid, and Noma Nazir-had already quit singing in the wake of the “fatwa” issued by the Grand Mufti.