Srinagar: Two policemen on guard duty at a court complex in Jammu and Kashmir’s southern Pulwama district were killed and another was injured in a pre-dawn militant attack on Tuesday.
In a separate attack, 10 jawans of Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) were injured in neighbouring Anantnag district, the officials said.
The police said that militants opened indiscriminate fire using automatic weapons at a guard post at the new court complex in Pulwama, about 32 km south of summer capital Srinagar, early on Tuesday. At that time, people in large numbers were praying in mosques and hospices across the Valley to mark Shab-e-Qadr, the night of decree or power when, as per Islamic belief, the first verses of the Quran were revealed to Prophet Muhammad.
The officials said that three policemen were injured in the attack and later two of them, identified as selection-grade constable Ghulam Rasool Lone and Ghulam Hassan Wagay, succumbed to their injuries.
Pulwama’s SSP Muhammad Aslam Choudhary said that the gunmen targeted the police guard-room at Takiya Wagam, injuring three policemen. “While two of them achieved martyrdom soon after the attack, Manzoor Ahmed, the third cop who sustained bullet wounds, is being treated at a Srinagar hospital,” he said. Earlier, the Kashmir police had tweeted, “Terrorists attacked guard posts at Pulwama court complex. In the exchange of fire, two policemen attained martyrdom. Area is being sanitised”. A report said that Lone and Wagay had died on the spot.”
The attack took place hours after the Kashmir police had in another tweet said, “We wish families of martyrs, the police, army, CAPF personnel & our followers a blissful #Shabeqadar. Let us pray for peace & prosperity of our state & nation on this auspicious night. Jai Hind.”
During Shab-e-Qadr last year, a mob had lynched J&K deputy superintendent of police Muhammd Ayub Pandit while on duty outside Srinagar’s Grand Mosque, the incident which was widely condemned across the state and beyond.
Commenting on the Pulwama incident, the chief spokesman of the PDP-BJP government and the state’s work minister, Syed Naeem Akhter, wrote on Twitter, ‘’Repeat of shameful lynching of DSP Ayub Pandit, on his anniversary. Perpetrators worst enemies of Kashmir, it’s people, Islam. Stupid to think guns looted after killing humans will arm them enough to fight any successful war. Silence?”
Former Chief Minister and vice president of opposition National Conference (NC) Omar Abdullah also took to social media to condemn the incident and said that if the militants are hit hard by security forces after the conditional Ramzan truce ends they alone should be blamed for it. “With the militant organisations doing their best to make sure the ceasefire is a failure they will only have themselves to blame if the security forces come back at them even harder when the ceasefire ends,” he said.
In another tweet, Mr. Abdullah said that the attack took place during the auspicious night of Shab-e-Qadr and hence those involved in it were destined to find themselves in hell. “And that too on the night of Shab-e-Qadr. The killers of these police personnel deserve nothing but the eternal flames of hell & that is where they are destined to find themselves. Condolences to the families of the deceased,” he said.
Later in a statement here, Mr. Abdullah said it was “an act of cowardice and barbarity where two brave policemen were mercilessly killed on the holiest of the holy nights in Ramzan”.
The police officials said that after the brief exchange of fire, the militants escaped from the area. A search operation by security forces was soon launched in the area but no arrests were made, the local sources said. SSP Pulwama said that the militants chose to attack the policemen “on a night when Muslims were busy in praying for peace and seek forgiveness from and blessings of God”.
The police sources said that the assailants fled with the service weapons of the policemen before fleeing the scene.
Later during the day, a wreath laying ceremony was held at Pulwama’s district police lines during which senior police and civil administration officials paid floral tributes to the slain cops. In the afternoon, thousands of people turned up at the funeral of slain policeman Mr. Wagay in his native village Wohlutra Panzala in Rafiabad area of north-western Baramulla district. Large number of people attended the funeral of the other policeman in neighbouring Kupwara district, a report received here said.
Meanwhile, ten CRPF jawans were injured in a grenade attack by suspected militants in Anantnag’s Janglat Mandi area. The officials said that the injured jawans were immediately shifted to hospital where condition of all of them is stated to be stable.
The officials said that this was the 45th attack carried out by militants against the security forces across the Kashmir Valley since May 16 when the Centre announced conditional ceasefire by suspending anti militancy operations in the State to “help the Muslim brothers and sisters to observe Ramzan peacefully and without any difficulties”.
The police on Tuesday also said that it defused an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) planted by militants along Kanji Nag link-road in Awantipora area of Pulwama. “The IED was found and subsequently defused by Bomb Disposal Squad (BDS) without causing any damage,” a police spokesman said.
A report from neighbouring Shopian said that the Army jawans resorted to aerial firing in the district’s DK Pora village after a group of youth hurled stones at their Casper vehicle. The Army personnel had gone to the village to remove an anti-India graffiti which was resisted by local youth, the report said. End it
