Srinagar: Fierce gun battles raged on the second day running on Sunday in Kashmir Valley’s southern Kulgam district, leaving two more militants dead and an Indian Army jawan martyred. With fresh casualties, the death toll in the two separate clashes has risen to eight — six militants and two soldiers.
The Army jawans who laid down their lives have been identified as Lance Naik Pardeep Kumar of 9 Para Special Forces and Sepoy Pravin Janjal Prabhakar of 1 Rashtriya Rifles. The identities of the slain militants are being ascertained, the officials said.
The back-to-back gun fights between holed-up militants and the security forces started in Kulgam’s Frisal Chinnigam and Modergam on Saturday afternoon. In the initial exchange of fire at Modergam, Lance Naik Kumar was critically injured. He was rushed to a nearby medical facility, but he succumbed to his injuries.
While the Modergam clash was underway, security forces engaged another group of militants in a fierce gun battle at Frisal Chinnigam and neutralised four of them within a couple of hours, the officials said, adding that two more militants were killed as the clashes entered the second day Sunday.
Jammu and Kashmir’s DGP Rashmi Ranjan Swain, while confirming the killing of six militants in twin encounters, termed it a “milestone achievement”. He told reporters: “So far, the bodies of six terrorists have been found lying scattered at the encounter sites. Two encounters are going on at separate places. The killing of six terrorists is obviously a milestone achievement.”
Swain added: “There is a possibility of the presence of local terrorists as well. Once the operation is fully over, we will be able to find out the identities and affiliations of slain terrorists.”
The police chief, hinting at the operations to flush out militants from Frisal Chinnigam and Modergam areas were launched on tip-offs, said, “The success with which these operations have been executed has been possible also because of the active support of the people.” He asserted, “Seemingly, we will be able to take this fight to its logical conclusion soon, even though the enemy won’t stop its activities (sic)."
In a separate incident, an Army jawan was injured when militants opened fire on a security post in a remote village in J&K's frontier district of Rajouri on Sunday, officials said.
They said the gunmen targeted a sentry post of the Territorial Army at Galuthi in the Manjakote area of Rajouri at around 4 am, prompting the sentry to retaliate. After an exchange of fire for nearly half-an-hour, the militants managed to flee into the nearby forests.
At the first light, the Army, with the help of the J&K police, launched a massive search operation to track down the attackers, a report said.
Meanwhile, a wreath-laying ceremony was held here at which the Commander of Srinagar-based Chinar Corps (15 Corps) Lt Gen. Rajiv Ghai, J&K’s Chief Secretary Atal Dullo, DGP Swain and other dignities and all ranks of the Corps paid homage to the slain Army personnel.
A report from Mumbai said that the last rites of Sepoy Pravin Janjal will be held in his native village Morgaon Bhakre in Maharashtra’s Akola district on July 8. The 26-year-old soldier had joined the Army in 2019 and was in the Second Mahar Regiment in 2020.
He was posted in Manipur earlier and then placed in Kulgam as part of the counterinsurgency Rashtriya Rifles of the Army four months ago.
