Pulwama-like tragedy averted in J&K: Police
SRINAGAR/NEWDELHI: A car packed with 60 kg explosives was intercepted in a late night operation on Wednesday by a joint team of security forces in south Kashmir’s Pulwama district, averting what could have been a repeat of the 2019 suicide bombing of a Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) convoy that killed 40 troopers.
The explosives were later detonated by the Jammu & Kashmir Police personnel at an isolated stretch since it was considered too risky to defuse the car bomb. In a video released by the police, the car can be seen turning into a huge ball of fire before enveloping the area in thick smoke.
“This is such great work. Imagine if this had led to loss of lives. Just grateful this is not mixed in with human ash,” said police officer Rayees Mohammad
Bhat, who also tweeted a nine-second video of what he described as the “ashfall” from the explosion.
Jammu & Kashmir Police
officers who examined the car bomb before it was detonated suspect Waleed Bhai, a notorious bomb maker of the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) terror group, had put together the car bomb.
But the car bomb, a senior police officer told Hindustan Times, also exemplifies that the line between terror groups was only notional since they were working closely.
“This is purely a Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Taiba joint operation. But the (terror) factory is located in Pakistan, whether it produces terrorists of Hizbul Mujahideen, JeM or TRF (The Resistance Front),” Jammu & Kashmir Police chief Dilbag Singh told HT.
The initial intelligence input that led to an overnight operation in Pulwama was that a Hizbul Mujahideen terrorist was driving the car. The input didn’t indicate which route he would take. “So, joint teams of the J&K Police, CRPF and the army mapped all the possible routes and set up checkpoints,” a Jammu & Kashmir Police officer aware of the developments said.
When the car suspected to be carrying the bomb was spotted at Ayekhand, the security forces — who had positioned themselves away from the road — started firing at the car. The terrorist drove for a bit before stopping and escaping into the forest.
The explosives were being carried in a drum on the rear seat of a Santro car which had a fake registration number plate. “Possibly more explosives could be fitted elsewhere in the vehicle,” the police officer said.
Security forces waited till dawn and evacuated people living in the neighbourhood.
“The vehicle was exploded in situ by the Bomb Disposal Squad as moving the vehicle would have involved serious threat,” the official said.
Initial investigations said the vehicle’s registration number was traced to a scooter issued in Kathua district of Jammu province.
A top Kashmir police officer told HT that they had been working on this case for the last two months.
“This would have been a repeat of the (2019) Pulwama bombing,” he said, referring to the suicide bombing of a CRPF convoy that killed 40 troopers and brought India and Pakistan to the brink of war.
The incident led India to carry out air strikes at a terror facility in Pakistan’s Balakot. Islamabad retaliated by attempting to carry out strikes at Indian installations in Kashmir.
India shot down an F-16 plane that was being used to fire at Indian locations.
A senior counter-terror official in Delhi saw a link to the planned car bombing and Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan’s repeated statements accusing India of prepping for a “false flag operation in Kashmir”.
The reference to the “false flag operation” is part of Khan’s government narrative that Pakistan does not sponsor terror groups in Kashmir and India falsely accuses Islamabad of involvement so that it can launch attacks.
“The sequence of events clearly demonstrate that PM Imran Khan had been preparing the ground to deny involvement in terror attacks orchestrated from its territory and support of the deep state,” the counter-terror official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said.