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Four soldiers martyrd, one militant killed in gun battles in Kashmir

By FnF Defence Correspondent | PUBLISHED: 05, Oct 2015, 12:42 pm IST | UPDATED: 05, Oct 2015, 13:45 pm IST

Four soldiers martyrd, one militant killed in gun battles in Kashmir Srinagar: Four soldiers and a militant were killed in two gun battles in Kupwara district of north Jammu and Kashmir on Monday, a day after two terrorists were killed in in Tral area of Pulwama district of the state.

An operation was launched in Haphruda forest in Handwara, following information about the presence of militants. Officials said the army and the state police’s Special Operation Group carried out the operation.

Four soldiers were killed in the gun battle with the militants, the army said. The gunfight, which erupted on Sunday night, was still on, said an army spokesperson in Srinagar.

In a separate incident, a skirmish broke out during an operation in Lolab area in which a militant was killed, an army spokesperson said.

Days after India asked Pakistan to de-terrorise its territory, security forces dealt a major blow to the Pakistan based Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) on Sunday when they gunned down two top foreign militants in a surgical operation in Tral-Awantipora area of south Kashmir's Pulwama district. A soldier of Indian army suffered injures in the gun battle.

Identified as Adil Pathan and Chota Burmi, the duo was operating in the valley since 2010 and has been involved in number of attacks on the security forces and civilians particularly in south Kashmir.

The killing of the two ultras comes five days after India hit back at Pakistan rejecting its proposal to de-militarise Kashmir and instead asked the neighboring county to de-terrorise.

Pakistan-based JeM has been blamed for several major attacks in militancy-hit Jammu and Kashmir and Delhi, including the one on Parliament on December 13, 2001.

Across Jammu and Kashmir, there were 70 infiltration bids last year during which 65 terrorists managed to sneak in while 136 were pushed back. In 2013, there were 91 bids by 280 terrorists and 97 were able to slip past the army’s three-tiered counter-infiltration grid.

Police said the encounter broke out when Rashtirya Riffles of the Indian army and Jammu and Kashmir police encircled Hari-Kaigam village after receiving specific intelligence inputs about the presence of high value targets in the area.

As the security forces were zeroing-in on the specific hideout, the militants hiding inside fired on them triggering a brief but fierce gun battle. Security forces later gunned down the two militants who were wanted for different crimes in the south Kashmir area.

"The operation has also led to the recovery of two AK47 rifles and other war like stores from the slain terrorists. One army soldier who sustained a gunshot wound was immediately evacuated and his condition is reported to be stable," said Colonel NN Joshi, defence spokesman at Srinagar.

Deputy inspector general of police, south Kashmir range, Nitesh Kumar told dna it was a very clean and surgically conducted operation. There was no collateral damage, he said.

Putting all speculation about their nationalities to rest, Kumar said the duo was from Pakistan and were known by their code names in the Kashmir Valley. "When they (ultras) infiltrate they change their names and use only codes," Kumar said.

Chota Burmi and Adil Pathan belonged to JeM founded by Moulana Masood Azhar, a dreaded militant commander, who was one of the three ultras released in exchange of passengers of hijacked Indian Airlines plane IC 814 from Kathmandu in 1999. Azhar-led JeM was also involved in the attack on Parliament in 2001.

A few years later one of the masterminds of the attack, Gazi Baba, was killed in an encounter with the Border Security Force in Noorbagh area of Srinagar.

The recent spike in violence in the state comes against the backdrop of a sharp downturn in relations between India and Pakistan following the cancellation of talks between the national security advisers in August. India has insisted that Pakistan must address the issue of terrorism to create grounds for the resumption of bilateral talks.
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