ADVERTISEMENT
Two LeT, TRF militants killed in encounter in J&K's KulgamSecurity forces launched a cordon and search operation in Okay village of Kulgam district
Zulfikar Majid
DHNS
Last Updated IST
There were no reports of any casualties so far on either side. Credit: AFP Photo
There were no reports of any casualties so far on either side. Credit: AFP Photo

Two local militants affiliated with Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), The Resistance Front (TRF) were killed in an encounter with security forces in south Kashmir’s Kulgam district on Tuesday.

“#KulgamEncounterUpdate: 01 more #terrorist killed (Total=2). Both the killed terrorists are locals & linked with proscribed #terror outfit LeT/TRF. They were involved in several terror crimes,” Kashmir Zone Police tweeted.

The gun fight erupted after a joint team of J&K police, Army’s 9 Rashtriya Rifles and CRPF launched a cordon-and-search operation (CASO) in Okay village, Kulgam, 60 kms from here, following inputs about presence of militants in the area, a police official said.

ADVERTISEMENT

As the joint search party approached the suspected spot, the hiding militants fired upon them who retaliated, triggering off an encounter in which two ultras were killed, he said.

TRF is believed to be frontal of the LeT and has come into the broader spotlight after it claimed killings of civilians belonging to the minority communities in the first week of October.

The latest encounter came a day after two LeT militants were killed in separate shootouts on Srinagar outskirts on Monday. Earlier on December 31, three militants and an Army soldier were killed in a gunfight in Panthachowk area on the outskirts of Srinagar city.

Earlier, six militants were killed in two separate gun battles with security forces in Kulgam and neighbouring Anantnag districts on December 31. In 2021, over 170 militants were killed in nearly 90 encounters across Kashmir.

According to police figures, 156 ultras, including 73 foreigners, were active in Kashmir as on December 31. This is for the first time that the number of active militants in the Valley has come down to less than 200 since the insurgency erupted in Kashmir in 1990.

In 2021, out of 128 locals who joined militancy, 79 were killed and 17 arrested.

Watch the latest DH Videos here:

ADVERTISEMENT
(Published 04 January 2022, 14:47 IST)