Please come out, take your son in arms': Militant's wife had asked him to surrender

Awantipora: Sparing no efforts, Jammu and Kashmir police on Thursday took the help of the wife and five-year-old son of a holed up Lashker-e-Taiba(LeT) militant here to make him surrender but it was in vain.

Mohd Shafi Shergojri, a 32-year-old resident of Bandipora in North Kashmir, was among the two militants holed up inside a residential house that was cordoned off by security forces in the wee hours of the morning. The place is 35 km from Srinagar city.

Upon ascertaining the identity of the two militants holed up inside the house who turned out to be locals, senior police officials of South Kashmir decided to locate their

families so that they could appeal to them to make him surrender, eyewitnesses said.

Deputy Inspector General of South Kashmir S Pani and Superintendent of Police Zahid Malik while making appeals to the two holed up militants to give up sent a police team to Kakpora in Bandipore, 95 km from the encounter site.

Another team was rushed to Koel in adjoining Pulwama district to look for the parents of another holed up militant 25-year-old Jahangir Ahmed Ganie but none could be traced.

Both Shergojri and Ganie were categorised as "A" class militants of the banned LeT and were activated in the militant cadre in September 2015.

"Please come out. Please take your son in your arms. He is missing you," the shriek of Aktara Begum, wife of Shergojri, pierced the uneasy calm at the encounter site.

She even brought her five-year-old son who cried aloud.

Police officials present at the encounter site also supported the appeals of the family and promised a fair trial and humane approach.

However, all the appeals fell on deaf ears and finally the security forces had to launch an all-out operation to either nab them or eliminate them. Both the militants were subsequently killed in the encounter.