Moles in police behind attacks on cops’ families?

Jammu and Kashmir police has begun an operation to identify moles within, who are suspected to be leaking vital operational information to terror outfits as their families are being threatened by the militants.

While the J and K Police top brass is silent on the issue, sources in the security establishement say some policemen have been earmarked for carrying out a thorough probe into the cases where militants, mainly belonging to the banned Hizbul Mujahideen, have threatened the families of policemen engaged in counter-insurgency operations.

A recent incident in which militants barged into the house of a policeman at Shopian, who is posted as the personal assistant to an officer in Pulwama, raised eyebrows within the security establishment in the Valley.

The militants, while firing warning shots and threatening the family members with dire consequences, told them that the policeman (identity not disclosed) was responsible for the death of their fellow terrorists as he had tipped off the establishment about their whereabouts.

The incident sounded an alarm bell as the matter about the alleged tip-off was highly classified, the sources said. They said the terror groups have been increasingly targeting the policemen, their families and political workers in the recent past.

While the families of policemen have been receiving threats since March this year, such incidents have reached an alarming level last weekend when as many as 14 families of cops engaged in counter-insurgency operations were targeted in Shopian and Kulgam areas of South Kashmir, they said.

The sudden spurt in such incidents has prompted the police headquarters to issue an advisory whereby the policemen were asked not to visit their homes for a few months.