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Thursday,
May 15, 2003, Chandigarh, India  
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Jawan, 12 ultras killed in J&K Pakistani shelling forces villagers to flee Soften Indo-Pak border: NC BJP flays NC on dialogue issue BJP high command calls leaders
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Srinagar-Leh road to be opened
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Jawan, 12 ultras killed in J&K Srinagar, May 14 An official spokesman said an encounter took place between militants and security forces at Dorasani in north Kashmir early this morning during which one militant each of the Jamait-ul-Mujahiden and the Lashker-e-Toiba (LeT) were killed. An AK rifle, a UBGL with two grenades and six hand grenades were recovered from the slain militants. About yesterday's clash at Fhamba Sadau in south Kashmir, the spokesman said troops on specific information that a group of militants had sneaked into the area from Doda, launched an operation. He said when the troops were moving forward in the woods, militants attacked them with grenades and automatic weapons. The troops immediately retaliated and in the four-hour-long clash, seven militants were killed. He said militants shot at and critically wounded a second officer of Karan Nagar police station at Kaksarai Chowk last evening. The spokesman said the police officer later died in the hospital. He said security forces arrested a militant, Mohamamd Ashraf Akhoon, with a pistol, a magazine and a grenade at Khanpora in Baramulla. JAMMU: An Army jawan and two militants were among five people killed in the Jammu region during the past 24 hours. Official sources said an ultra was killed in an encounter with the security forces at Chatar-Nala in Pouni area of Udhampur district this afternoon. In another incident, an Army jawan and a militant were killed in an encounter in Sajyot Harni Village in Mendhar Sector of Poonch district late last night. Five suspected Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) militants, two dressed in Army fatigues, barged into the house of Kala Khan, ex-serviceman of the Border Security Force (BSF), at Nagrota village of Rajouri district late last night. They kidnapped Kala Khan and later killed him. His body was recovered from Saldhar forest area, 2 km from his house this morning, the sources added. The body of a civilian, Bodh Raj, was recovered from Bela Nala in the Budhal area of Rajouri district today, the sources said and added that he might have been killed by militants.
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Pakistani shelling forces villagers to flee Srinagar, May 14 Army sources here said Pakistani artillery pickets in these sectors resorted to unprovoked shelling, throwing life haywire in villages close to the LoC. No loss of life or damage to civilian property was reported. The Army retaliated against the Pakistani firing. The sources said the entire civilian population of Khatiyar village in the Drass sector fled to escape the intense shelling. As many as 200 persons, including women and children, moved out of Khatiyar. Elsewhere in the Kashmir valley, two militants — Abu Vikas of the Lashkar-e-Toiba and Abu Malik of the Jaish-e-Muhammad — were killed in a gunbattle with troops of the 18 Rashtriya Rifles in the Lolab area of Kupwara district. Militants gunned down a former special police officer, Irshad Ahmad, in Tral, 48 km from here. JAMMU: Pakistani troops fired on three Indian posts in the Arnia and RS Pora sectors in Jammu district on Tuesday night. No damage was caused on the Indian side, official sources said. The Pakistani rangers, using light arms, fired about 500 or 600 rounds from across the international border on the border outposts of Krotna, Nikowal and Bakerpur. Indian troops retaliated and intermittent exchange of firing between two sides continued for a few hours. Damage or losses on the enemy side could not be ascertained so far.
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Soften Indo-Pak border: NC
Jammu, May 14 “Talks between India and Pakistan will help in resolving outstanding issues, including Kashmir, and we pray for the success of these talks”, NC provincial president Ajay Sadhotra told mediapersons here. “There was need to soften the border and to allow the people of Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and our state to meet and interact so as to end the alienation between them”, he said. Mr Sadhotra said former Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah had been advocating that the people of the two divided parts of Jammu and Kashmir be allowed to meet by opening the roads along the border. This was one of the reasons that Dr Abdullah had been asking for conversion of the Line of Control into the permanent border between India and Pakistan so that the borders in the state were thrown open for the people of the two sides, he said. Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed’s recent statement that the borders should be opened between Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and Jammu and Kashmir was more or less a reiteration of their demand, he said. Even the Congress, a partner in the present coalition government in the state, in its recent election manifesto, had demanded the restoration of autonomy in the state, Mr Sadhotra said, adding that the state government had been, in one way or the other, following their political line. Mr Sadhotra, who arrived here yesterday along with two MLAs and some party functionaries after completing a four-day mass contact programme in the Doda district, alleged that the administration had collapsed in the district. Roads were damaged, many tehsils were without electricity and water and development had come to a standstill, he alleged.
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BJP flays NC on dialogue issue Jammu, May 14 The BJP spokesman, Mr Hari Om, in a statement here today, said that the BJP was of the view that such demand of the NC only indicated its contempt for the country’s secular and democratic polity as well as its deep faith in the politics of separatism based on religious and parochial considerations. The NC stand, in the opinion of the BJP, is fraught with dangerous ramifications, as it has the potential of damaging national interests and interests of an overwhelming majority of the people of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh, who vouch for a system that is Indian, democratic, people-centric, responsive and corruption-free. Mr Hari Om said that the BJP also condemned the remarks of the Pulwama and Anantnag-based Peoples Democratic Party’s newly appointed president Mehbooba Mufti. The Indian troops are fighting splendidly against the Pakistani irregulars, the ISI-sponsored terrorists and the champions of “Nizam-e-Mustafa” and sacrificing all for the defence of the country. To condemn the Indian Army and the paramilitary forces for the so-called human rights violations was to embolden the anti-India and communal forces and create a situation where terrorism and fanaticism would reign supreme, he added. The BJP asked the NC leaders and others of its ilk not to dance to the tunes of the All-Party Hurriyat Conference, whose area of influence is “rather limited” and whose religio-political programme “patently anti-humanity”. |
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BJP high command calls leaders Jammu, May 14 It is learnt that the BJP President, Mr Venkiah Naidu, and the general secretary, Mr Raj Nath Singh, will try to unite the two factions. The others who have been summoned to the Capital are Mr Ashok Khajuria and Mr Ajay Jamwal of the Nirmal Singh group and Lala Shiv Charan Gupta, veteran party leader and member of the state Working Committee of the party, and Mr Chander Mohan Sharma, vice-president of the party, who are leading the "dissidents". The Union Minister of State for Defence, Mr Chaman Lal Gupta, is also expected to be invited to the meeting to hammer out a solution to the crisis in the party. The state unit of the BJP has initiated disciplinary action against Lala Shiv Charan Gupta and four other leaders by sending show-cause notices to them for having "indulged in anti-party activity" by organising a meeting to celebrate the golden jubilee of the erstwhile Praja Parishad. A section of the party has claimed that there is nothing anti-party in remembering those stalwarts of the party who laid down their lives while struggling for the complete merger of Jammu and Kashmir with the rest of India. |
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Srinagar-Leh road to be opened Srinagar, May 14 The highway, which connects the cold desert region to the rest of Jammu and Kashmir, was closed to traffic in November last year due to heavy snowfall which covers the 434 km-long road for months every year. An official spokesman said yesterday that Kargil’s District Development Commissioner Kacho Isfandiyar Khan visited Zoji La on the highway and took stock of the snow clearance work. He was told by engineers of the Border Roads Organisation that the road would be thrown open in this month.
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