Shopian: The Lashkar e Toiba district commander for Shopian has been killed along with an associate in a brief encounter at Dragad area of Sugan village, police said on Wednesday. One military personnel was also killed while two others sustained injuries during the exchange of fire with the militants, police said.

An army party belonging to 44 Rashtriya Rifles was carrying out searches in the area when they came under heavy gunfire from the hiding militants, police said. The fire was retaliated which ensued into an encounter. Later, police and paramilitary forces also joined the army, police said.

The encounter according to locals took place in an open space with no damage to civilian property.

According to police, two militants including Adil Ahmad Wani, a resident of Shirmal village who was district commander of LeT was killed in the encounter. Wani was active in the area since July 2020, police said. The second militant was yet to be identified when this report was filed.

According to a police official, three army personnel sustained injuries during the firefight with militants. He said that one of them succumbed to the injuries while two others are undergoing treatment at army hospital in Srinagar.

Kashmir police chief Vijay Kumar in a tweet wrote that Adil Wani was involved in the killing of a non-local carpenter at Litter village of Pulwama. He said that 15 militants were killed during last two weeks in Kashmir.

A press release issued by the police said that on a specific input regarding presence of militants in Dragad area of Shopian, a joint cordon and search operation was launched by Police, 44RR and 178Bn CRPF in the area.

“During the search operation, as the presence of terrorists got ascertained, they were given repeated opportunities to surrender; instead they fired indiscriminately upon the joint search party which was retaliated leading to an encounter,” the police statement said.

“As per police records, both the killed terrorists were involved in several terror crime cases including civilian atrocities. Terrorist Adil Ahmad was active since July-2020 and was involved in several terror crime cases including recent killing of one poor carpenter Sageer Ahmad Ansari of Saharanpur UP at Litter Pulwama on 16/10/2021. One of the killers of said carpenter was resident of the same village and got active recently after joining terror folds. Reportedly, after committing the crime both terrorists shifted from Litter to Dragad Shopian,” police stated.

“Police have registered case under relevant sections of law and investigation has been initiated. People are requested to cooperate with Police till the area at encounter site is completely sanitized and cleared of all the explosive materials, if any,” it added.

Raashid Hassan