Dujana ‘first martyr’ of Qaeda’s India cell: Musa

Zakir Rashid Bhat, alias Zakir Musa, the Kashmiri militant 22named as the head of Al Qaeda’s recently launched India cell “Ansar Ghuzwat-Ul-Hind” has owned Abu Dujana as being its “first martyr” of the group.

Dujana, a Pakistani national, who figured at number one in the list of 12 “most wanted terrorists” released by the Army in June, was along with another Lashkar-e-Tayyaba militant Arif Nabi Dar alias Rehan alias Arif Lalhari, a local Kashmiri, killed during a firefight with the security forces in southern Pulwama district on August 1.

“In the making of Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind, they played a key role and became first martyrs of this jihad movement,” Musa said in an audio message, which has gone viral on social media.

Meanwhile, three gunmen

Dujana, a Pak national, who figured at number one in the list of 12 ‘most wanted terrorists’ released by the Army in June, was killed during a firefight with the security forces on Aug. 1

believed to be LeT cadres were killed in a gunbattle with the forces in Sopore area of northwestern Baramulla district overnight, officials here said on Saturday.

Musa, while confirming his affiliation with Ansar Ghuzwat-Ul-Hind, claimed that Dujana and Lalhari were its founding members. He paid glowing tributes to the slain duo and said in the two-minute audio “When Dujana joined us, the so-called bosses of jihad in Pakistan placed a number of hurdles for him.” He termed Dujana and Lalhari as “Mardan-e-Hur” (the brave free men). Musa, a close associate of slain Hizbul Mujahid-een commander Burhan Wani, had declared in April that Kashmiris should not “fall for nationalism”, the traditional goal of the separatists. He had threatened to chop off the heads of separatist leaders over their calling the struggle as a political movement.

Separatist leaders Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Muhammad Yasin Malik, who are part of an issuebased alliance named by them as “Joint Resistance Leadership”, had earlier in a joint statement said the ongoing “freedom movement” in Kashmir had nothing to do with ISIS and Al-Qaeda-like organisations. They had also said that there is no role for these groups in “our movement”, which was “indigenous” and seeks freedom for 15 million people of the state and that the same is not driven by religion.

— PTI Villagers mourn during the funeral procession of Abid Hamid Mir, one of the three LeT militants in Haajan who were killed during an encounter with the security forces in Sopore area in Baramulla district of north Kashmir on Saturday.