by Hakeem Irfan

SRINAGAR: Jammu and Kashmir police claim to have killed three militants in an encounter in Anantnag district of south Kashmir on wee hours of Monday.

The encounter police officials informed was brief and among three militants, two were locals identified as Eesa Fazili of Soura in Srinagar and Syed Owais of Kokernag in south Kashmir, while as the identity of third militant is being ascertained. The joint operation was launched on a specific input, which took militants by surprise and didn’t give enough time to escape or breach the cordon. Both Fazili and Owais were BTech students and left studies to join militant ranks. The militants were associated with Hizb ul Mujahideen and Tehreek ul Mujahideen.

In wake of the killings, J&K government, fearing protests, ordered closure of all schools and colleges in Srinagar and also imposed restrictions in several parts of the city, as Fazili hails from Srinagar. Kashmir University in Srinagar and Islamic University of Science and Technology in Awantipora of south Kashmir postponed all the exams scheduled today and suspended classwork as well. The board of school education has also postponed the exams informing that the fresh dates would be notified soon. Train services were also shut for a day.

The government also suspended high speed mobile internet service in Srinagar and south Kashmir ‘as precautionary measure’ to avoid instant circulation of information or images on social media and various chat and messenger groups.

“Your police seeks cooperation of citizens for maintaining order and ensuring peace. Today, you will find restrictions in some parts of Srinagar. While it is a cause of inconvenience, we assure these control orders are temporary…” J&K police tweeted.

The encounter in south Kashmir, J&K police says was carried out pursuing credible leads of presence of militants.

“Security forces started search in the Hakoora area of Anantnag. While the search was going on the hiding militants fired upon the party ensuing an encounter during which three militants were killed,” read the official police statement.

J&K police claim to have recovered AK 47 rifles, pistols and hand grenades from the spot and during the encounter no collateral damage was reported.

According to police one of the militant was involved in recent attack on a police guard post at Soura on the outskirts of Srinagar in which one constable was killed.

After the killing of more than 213 militants in 2017, ‘Operation All Out’ to wipe out militancy in J&K continues with killings of around 28 militants this year. As per the official data, around 124 militants have managed to infiltrate last year, while as equal number of locals have joined the militant ranks in the same period.

The civilian killings also continue in Kashmir. Last week, Mirwaiz Umer Farooq of Hurriyat said that 13 civilian killings reflects that situation in Kashmir is ‘extremely grim and fast deteriorating.’