‘MLA driver under lens for Hizb link’

J&K police says reports that man was involved in Amarnath terror not true

The Jammu and Kashmir police driver Towseef Ahmed detained by the police, earlier this week, was not involved in the July 10 terror incident in Anantnag district in which eight Amarnath pilgrims were killed and 18 others wounded.

He was wanted for his alleged role in a murderous assault on a special police officer in June, this year, and has now been formally arrested along with three others for his alleged role in the incident and for his links with a group of militants belonging to Hizb-ul-Mujahedin, the police said here on Sunday.

“The news circulated by a section of media and also through social media about Towseef ’s involvement in the Amarnath terror deaths is not true,” a police spokesman said. He made a fervent appeal to the media to “not to carry speculative and factually incorrect stories”.

The police said Ahmed was part of an overground workers’ group for the

He was wanted for his alleged role in a murderous assault on a special police officer in June this year

Hizb. It claimed that it has busted two modules of the Hizb outfit in southern Shopian and north-western Baramulla districts of the Valley.

The members of the twin groups, five of whom have been arrested, were allegedly providing logistics support to militants and luring young boys of the Valley to militancy before sending them to Pakistan for receiving arms training in PoK, the police said.

A statement said that while pursuing a case registered under various provisions of law, including Section 307 (attempt to murder) of the Ranbir Panel Code and the Arms Act at a local police station in southern Shopian, the police could lay its hands on four overground workers of the Hizb.

“The case pertained to the June 11 terror attack on a special police officer, Khurshid Ahmed, at Imam Sahib, Shopian. During the course of the investigation, four persons were arrested for their involvement in providing logistics support and participation in the furthering of said criminal act,” said a statement issued by the police here.

It added that it has also been revealed that the said attack was carried out by one Nazim Nazir Dar at the behest of the Hizb cadres, Saddam Padder and Irfan Abdullah Ganie, both residents of Heff village of Shopian.