Srinagar: Jammu and Kashmir police chief Dilbagh Singh Monday said that the killing of a Personal Security Officer (PSO) of a PDP leader at Natipora, Srinagar, is an “attempt to disrupt the ongoing election process and the prevailing peaceful environment across Kashmir”.

He said that police have “clues about the number of militants involved in the attack and area where they came from” and that “attackers will soon be brought to book.”
Talking to reporters on the sidelines of wreath laying ceremony of Manzoor Ahmed, the slain PSO at District Police Lines (DPL) Srinagar, the DGP said, “One must understand that J&K is going through an important exercise at present—the exercise at the grassroots level and there is a huge participation of people, which is commendable”.

Singh said there had been “elaborate” security arrangement for the PDP leader, “but we can’t put the movement of people to a complete halt while ensuring the grassroot level exercise”. “In between, there is a hidden movement of an odd number of anti-national elements as well, ” he said.

About PDP President, Mehbooba Mufti’s allegation that J&K administration has left the opposition leaders in a “vulnerable position by downgrading their security”, the DGP termed the allegations as “baseless”. “The PDP leader (Haji Pervez Ahmed) at whose residence PSP Manzoor was killed, was asked by the police to shift the location as his residence was in a congested area and prone to militant attacks. He never paid heed to our suggestions,” the DGP said. “He regularly violated security advisories. We reviewed his security and found there was a need of one PSO for him, but two were provided to him,” Singh said.

To a query what the motive of militants could be behind today’s attack, the J&K police chief said that the motive was “to disrupt the ongoing election process and the peaceful environment prevailing in the valley that was managed by people and the security agencies including police after a lot of efforts.”

Singh said attacks like today’s “can happen despite the security cover to the politicians”.
“BJP slain youth leader Waseem Bari had 10 PSOs but still got killed, ” Singh explained. (KNO)

Reader correspondent