SRINAGAR, 2 August 2006 — Three security personnel and two suspected militants were killed in gunbattles in India’s part of Kashmir yesterday, police said. The two rebels were killed after soldiers and police acting on a tip cordoned off the village of Chatipora in southwestern Kashmir, sparking a gunbattle, said police officer Nitish Kumar. A policeman was also killed in the fight. Chatipora is about 65 kilometers south of Srinagar, the main city of India’s Jammu-Kashmir state.
Meanwhile, two paramilitary troopers were killed when rebels opened fire on them in Srinagar, police said. The troopers were patrolling Srinagar’s Dalgate area when the rebels fired, killing one trooper and fatally wounding the other, said Farooq Ahmed, the deputy inspector-general of police. An unidentified man claiming to be from the militant group Jaish-e-Mohammed took credit for the attack in a call to the Kashmir News Service later yesterday. Jaish is among more than a dozen militant groups fighting India since 1989.
The rebel strike in the morning targeted two paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force personnel, one of whom died on the spot and the second succumbed to injuries in the hospital. A senior police officer said militants fired at two CRPF soldiers at point blank in the tourist hub of Dalgate on the banks of Dal Lake late Tuesday morning.
“One CRPF trooper died instantly while the other critically wounded soldier was taken to city’s SMHS hospital for treatment. However, he succumbed later,” said the officer. Immediately following the attack, paramilitary forces and the local police cordoned off the Dalgate area for searches. It must be mentioned that Dalgate is usually thronged by tourists and local holiday-makers, who go to the Dal Lake for boating, etc.
Late yesterday afternoon, two Indian paramilitary Border Security Force soldiers came under attack near the main SMHS hospital in the Kakasarai area in the city of summer capital of Jammu. “A party of the BSF was attacked by the militants outside the SMHS hospital today afternoon injuring two troopers in a shootout. The injured troopers were immediately taken inside the hospital for treatment, but they died because of critical bullet injuries,” said another senior police officer.
Troops immediately moved in and carried out searches in the area around the attack site. No group has so far owned responsibility for any of these attacks. Following these attacks authorities ordered a massive security beef up in the entire capital city. All passing vehicles were being searched as drop gates and barricades came up on city roads in uptown Srinagar after the militant attacks.
