SRINAGAR: Suspected militants snatched the rifles of policemen after attacking the guard post at the residence of a mainstream political activist in Begom village of Jammu and Kashmir’s southern Kulgam district overnight, officials here said on Thursday.
The activist had been identified in initial reports as opposition National Conference’s block president Abdur Rashid Khanday but the party’s working president Omar Abdullah denied it.
He tweeted, “To set the record straight, he was NOT a NC office-bearer & hasn’t been affiliated to the party since 2002 or so.” (sic).
Police sources said that a group of gunmen, believed to be the members of the Hizbul-Mujahedin, barged into the residential compound of Mr. Khanday at Begom during the intervening night of September 7 and 8, forced the policemen in his security detail to surrender their four service rifles to them. They left the place without causing any harm to the politician or the policemen but took away their weapons, the sources said.
The arms which the militants decamped with included two INSAS rifles, one SLR and 303 rifles each from the policemen who have since been placed under suspension by the authorities pending inquiry into the incident, the sources said.
A police spokesman while confirming the incident said here that unknown militants entered into the guard room at the residence of “political protectee” and decamped with the services weapons of his security guards. The spokesman said, “The police has taken the cognizance and investigations are on”
Separately, militants targeted a police station in neighbouring Pulwama district with rifle fire and grenades shortly after midnight Wednesday night, leading to an exchange of fire between them and the police.
