Three Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) militants, including a student, were killed in south Kashmir on Thursday morning, sparking clashes that resulted in the killing of a youth and injuries to over 50 protesters.
A Srinagar-based police spokesman said the Pulwama police, the Army’s 50 Rashtriya Rifles and CRPF acting on specific information about the presence of militants in Bank Mohalla, Kakapora, Pulwama, closed in on their hideout. The ensuing gun battle, which began around 9 p.m. on Wednesday, ended in the morning, and the house where the militants were holed up was razed.
“One Army official was injured but is stable,” said the spokesman.
The LeT militants were identified as Majid Hameed Mir, Shakir Ahmad Jugjoo and Irshad Ahmad Dar, all residents of Pulwama. Two AK rifles and one pistol were recovered from the encounter site.
“Mir was behind the killing of two sarpanches and a bank robbery. He, along with Gugjoo, killed two civilians,” said the police.
Scores of locals participated in the funerals of the three militants, with two coming from middle-class families. Mir, 19, according to his brother Imtiyaz Ahmad, was a final semester student at Kite Polytechnic College and was missing from June last year. The family owns orchards, restaurants and deals with poultry.
Gugjoo, 18, who was to join a college in Chandigarh on April 25 , went missing on April 22 as police launched a search for him. “We received his last call on Wednesday when he wanted to speak to his mother,” said his relative. The third militant was a sand-digger and a school dropout.
