A militant attack on a joint search party killed a policeman and injured a CRPF member in south Kashmir on Sunday, prompting the forces to further beef up security ahead of the two-day visit of Union home minister Amit Shah beginning on Tuesday.
Militants have stepped up attacks ahead of the trip. Jammu’s Udhampur district was rocked by back-to-back blasts inside two buses on Thursday, injuring two persons.
A police spokesman said militants attacked a joint party of the police and the CRPF at the Pinglena area of Pulwama district on Sunday in which policeman Javid Ahmad Dar was killed and an unidentified CRPF soldier was injured.
The police said reinforcements had been sent and the area was being cordoned off.
The attack comes hours after an encounter in Shopian where a Lashkar militant was killed during a three-hour operation.
Home minister Shah will arrive in Jammu and Kashmir on a two-day tour on Sunday. He will address two rallies in Rajouri and Baramulla districts and hold a series of meetings with officials.
The visit has put the security forces on their toes and prompted the authorities to increase patrolling and search of vehicles. Soon after Sunday’s attack, the security forces began stopping vehicles and conducting searches at several places.
Jammu police chief and additional director-general of police Mukesh Singh said a militant settled in Pakistan had directed a Jammu-based militant to carry out the blasts in Jammu ahead of a “high-profile ministerial visit”, referring to Shah’s trip.
Singh said Mohammad Amin Bhat, based in Pakistan, contacted local militant Aslam Sheikh through social media apps and provided him three sticky bombs and four IEDs through a drone.
On September 27, Bhat ordered him to plant bombs at suitable locations before Shah’s visit.
“He activated two IEDs and placed them in two buses. In one bus he set a timer of seven hours and in the other, he set a timer of 14 hours,” Singh said.
The police have recovered five IEDs, including three sticky bombs, and arrested two persons.
