Shopian: A militant was killed in a gunfight with government forces at Molu village in Shopian district on Wednesday. The encounter broke out at around 3:45pm when a patrolling party of the army’s 44 Rashtriya Rifles was fired upon when it was carrying out searches in a locality of Molu village, some nine kilometers away from district headquarters Shopian, police said.
Residents of Molu village said that they heard gunshots for about three minutes in the village. They said that army men were patrolling there when the shots were heard
Wednesday’s operation was the first in the district since July 18 when an encounter that was later alleged to be fake took place at Amshipora village. The army has instituted a court of inquiry into the alleged fake encounter and DNA samples of families which claim their civilian sons were killed in that encounter have been collected.
Government forces earlier in the day claimed recovery of 100 bullets and four grenades from different areas of the district besides arresting four persons involved.
The persons who were arrested were identified as Imtiyaz Ahmad Dar, resident of Ratnipora village, Parvaiz Ahmad Kumar and Sajad Ahmed Dhobi, both residents of Pinjora, and Shahid Manzoor, resident of Hillow village of Shopian district.
Police later in a statement said that one unidentified militant was killed at Molu and search operation was going on for any other militants in the area. “It was a patrolling party of 44 Rashtriya Rifles who were fired upon by militants ensuing into an encounter,” said the police statement.
Locals said that reinforcements were called for the operation but no gunshots were heard after the initial exchange of fire.

Raashid Hassan