Anantnag: A car laden with explosives was intercepted late Wednesday evening by government forces in Rajpora area of Pulwama district, Kashmir Inspector General of Police (IGP) Vijay Kumar told the media on Thursday.
A controlled blast of the vehicle was carried out by government forces early Thursday morning after evacuation of the civilians living nearby.
The blasting of the car caused some damage to several residential houses in the vicinity. A power supply transformer installed in the locality was damaged as well.
Kumar said that it was an attempt to carry out an attack similar to last year’s suicide bombing in Pulwama on February 14 that killed 40 CRPF men.
The Pulwama attack, as it came to be known, had brought India and Pakistan to the brink of war.
As per police, a Santro car, bearing number JK08 B-1426, was motioned to stop at a naka established by government forces in Ayengund area of Rajpora at about 9:00 PM Wednesday evening.
“The car jumped the barricade. The on-duty security personnel fired some warning shots,” a senior police officer in Pulwama district said, adding that the persons travelling the car abandoned it in Avengund village.
The car was traced but the persons in the car had escaped under cover of darkness, the officer said.
“A fake number plate was used on the car. It belongs to a two-wheeler in Kathua district,” the official said.
Kumar said that the car was kept under watch through the night while the adjoining houses were evacuated of residents. “The car was blasted early Thursday morning,” he said.
He said that the amount of explosives laden in the car was not known as it was not physically handled.
“We had been receiving inputs regarding a possible IED attack on the pattern of the Pulwama attack and last evening the inputs materialised to something credible, following which barricades were laid at several places in the area,” Kumar said.
He said that the attempt seemed to be to replicate the “Pulwama attack” of last year.
“A car laden with explosives, with a fake registration, was used in last year’s attack and the exact same thing was being done again,” Kumar said, adding that militants from Hizb-ul-Mujahideen and Jaish-e-Muhammad have been preliminary been found involved in the attempt.

Suhail A Shah