Police have launched a massive manhunt to nab the militants behind the incident.
Militants disarmed heavily armed policemen and decamped with four weapons when they stormed into a police picket guarding the minority Hindu inhabited Adijan village in south Kashmir’s Kulgam district on Saturday night.
Police said the incident occurred when a group of heavily armed militants overpowered the cops in the bunker and fled with four weapons including two INSAS and two SLR riffles along with six magazines full of bullets. “Four policemen were deployed in the picket. They did not fire (when ultras stormed into the bunker). They (militants) have decamped with four weapons,” Mohommad Irshad Khan, senior superintendent of police, Kulgam told Kashmir Post.
Police have launched a massive manhunt to nab the militants responsible for the incident. Investigations have also been started to probe as to why policemen did not act despite having enough weaponry to take on the militants. “We are looking into it. We will take action. It will take some time,” said Khan. Kashmir Pandit Sangrash Simiti (KPSS), an apex body of pandits who did not migrate from the valley at the onset of militancy, said there are around 15 to 20 families of Rajput clan putting up at the Adijan village.
“Like Uri, the Rajputs living in this village did not migrate. After the Nadimarg pandit massacre, the government established a police picket for the protection of the minority community in the village in 2003,” Sanjay K Tickoo, president KPSS, told Kashmir Post.
On the night of March 22-23, 2003, militants mowed down 24 Kashmiri Pandits including infants in a gruesome manner at Nadimarg village of Kulgam district sending shock waves across the nation and triggering migration of minuscule minority community members from this hamlet.
KPSS figures reveal that there are 654 Kashmir Pandit families comprising 3,000 people who did not migrate and are putting up in different places across the valley. “These pandits are living at 182 different places across the valley. There are around 110 places where police pickets have been established for the security of the minority community,” said Tickoo. This is not the first time that militants have disarmed the policemen deployed for the security of minorities in Kashmir. On May 4, 2012 militants in broad day light stormed into the police picket guarding a pandit-inhabited village of Parguchi in south Kashmir and decamped with two self-loading riffles.
On May 25 2012, militants decamped with three self-loading and one INSAS riffle when they disarmed the cops deployed for guarding the minority Sikh-inhabited Aarigam village in Tral area of south Kashmir.
