NIA raids sarpanch, 4 others in Kashmir in Davinder case
SRINAGAR: The National Investigation Agency on Sunday morning carried out searches at five places, including that of a sarpanch, in connection with a case in which a senior Jammu and Kashmir police officer was arrested while ferrying terrorists outside the valley, officials said here.
Multiple NIA teams, fanned in various parts of south Kashmir’s Kulgam and Shopian districts, carried out the searches at the residences of Rafi Ahmed Rather, an arrested militant, at Zainpora.
The NIA teams entered into the house of Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist Adil Hussain and Sarpanch Tariq Ahmed Mir besides the houses of Over Ground Workers (OGWs) at Maldera in Shopian and Kulgam, the officials said.
Some documents have been seized and these are being analysed, they said.
The NIA had taken over the case of Jammu and Kashmir’s Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) Davinder Singh, who was arrested on January 11 on charges of colluding with terrorists.
Singh’s arrest had stunned the J&K police force but it had also underscored the possibility that there might be other officers as well who could be colluding with terrorists.
The DSP has since been suspended.
The searches come days after NIA officers interrogated all the accused arrested in the case.
Besides Singh, the others arrested were: Syed Naveed Mushtaq Ahmed alias Naveed Babu, who is a self-styled commander of the Hizbul Mujahideen, Rafi Ahmed Rather and Irfan Shafi Mir, who claims to be an advocate.
They were arrested from the Srinagar-Jammu National Highway near Qazigund in South Kashmir.
Later, Naveed’s brother, Syed Irfan Ahmed, was arrested on January 23 after he was brought from Punjab.
He was in constant touch with his brother and had asked him to look for an accommodation in Chandigarh where they could escape the harsh winters months of Kashmir.
Mir, who was driving the vehicle when they were caught by police from a national highway in Kulgam district, may become a prize catch for the NIA as it is alleged he was acting on the orders of his masters in Pakistan. He had visited the neighbouring country five times on an Indian passport.
On January 29, the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF), the Centre’s leading counter-insurgency force, too, carried out a massive internal audit to check if there were any attempts of subversion within the force after the arrest of J&K police officer, Davinder Singh, CRPF chief AP Maheshwari.