40 down and counting: Forces on the verge of wiping out Pakistani terrorists in Valley

With the single-minded focus on terrorists who come to the Valley to mislead youngsters, destroy peace and inflict damage on life and property, the security forces have so far gunned down 40 terrorists from Pakistan.

New Delhi, Oct 31: Forty terrorists have been gunned down this year in the Valley. Jammu and Kashmir Director General of Police, Dilbag Singh said that the security forces have this year so far gunned down 40 terrorists from Pakistan in several operations carried out.

He said that the forces are attempting to locate and recover dozens of ready-made improvised explosive devices which have been used in the union territory by Pakistan's agencies.

Singh also said that the terrorists were tasked with targeting non-locals and those living in the UT for a long time. This was being done to provoke a violent reaction against Kashmiris living in other parts of the country.

"Their leadership has been wiped out to a greater extent. Pakistan agencies mostly try to keep the command of Jaish and Lashkar in the hands of Pakistani terrorists so that they can directly control the activities here. Our attempt this year was focused on outside terrorists who come here to mislead youngsters, destroy peace and inflict damage on life and property. In that context, there were many successful operations in which 40 Pakistan-based terrorists were killed in different operations," Singh told mediapersons.

"There are attempts from time to time to push in terrorists from across the border. There were attempts in Rajouri and Poonch which were foiled. Similarly, in Baramulla and Kupwara, the attempts were foiled. Also in some operations, we recovered dozens of IEDs which are ready to use. Unfortunately, there were some incidents in which these ready-made IEDs were used, particularly in Jammu, where there was some loss of life and property. Two such blasts happened in buses in Udhampur, and earlier, a blast had happened in this district in a vegetable market. Also, there was an incident on a bus earlier," he also said.

"Pakistan agencies will try to push in more terrorists. But our border security grid is strong. That is why, many such attempts have been foiled," Singh further added.

By June this year, the forces had gunned down 100 terrorists in various encounters in the Valley.

The action has become aggressive in wake of the Intelligence warning that there has been an increase in activity by terror groups at their launchpads across the border. A close watch is being kept at the border areas near Kashmir and Uri where the maximum launch pads are present.

The terrorists remaining in the Valley are from the Lashkar-e-Tayiba, Jaish-e-Mohammad and Hizbul Mujahideen. With 83, the Lashkar-e-Tayiba has the highest number of terrorists in the Valley followed by 30 from the JeM and 38 from Hizbul Mujahideen, officials tell OneIndia.

The security forces have their job cut out as Intelligence assessments clearly suggest that the Pakistan backed terror groups would look to continue with the targeted killings. In addition to this, the supply of pistols to the remotest areas of Jammu and Kashmir is an indicator that these terrorists would operate as lone wolves and carry out killings in the Valley.