Poonch infiltrators trekked down to Shopian: Reports

Ground Report | New Delhi: Poonch infiltrators in Shopian; The encounter lasted for more than 20 days on October 11 in the dense forests of Poonch in the Jammu division, with militants. The operation, in which nine Army personnel were killed in ambushes carried out in separate ambushes at Surankot and Mendhar on October 11 and 14, entered its 15th day on Monday.

Poonch infiltrators in Shopian

According to the TOI report, local sources said that it appears that 10 or more infiltrators from Poonch have moved to villages in South Kashmir's Shopian district. People of Shopian said that they were surprised to see armed militants hiding in the jungles of the area.

They said that some militants who fled during the encounter in Poonch went to hide in different villages of the Shopian district. Locals said the army is allotting new house numbers in different houses and recording the names and other details of the occupants, including the mobile numbers of all the family members.

New militant outlet claims attack on Poonch

Top Army officials said they are confident of tackling the Poonch infiltrators in a new way. According to locals, the army is allotting new house numbers to different firefighters and recording the names and other details of the occupants, including mobile phone numbers of all family members.

“This makes it easier to do background checks of residents and also to know the details of any visitors coming to the district. Allotting house numbers to all village houses means we have to contact our informers less because Contacting them puts them at risk of being exposed," said a senior military officer deputed to the district.

New militant claims attack

 A new militant organization has claimed responsibility for the last nine days of encounter between security forces and extremists along the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir’s Poonch. An organization named People’s Anti-Fascist Front (PAFF) has released an eight-minute video claiming responsibility, The Hindu reported.

In a video released on several channels of the Telegram mobile app, a man is narrating in the Kashmiri language about the incident that started on October 11.

Army Alert in Poonch: Strike on terror can happen anytime

The video claims that two unidentified extremists chased the Army Patrol party for 10 hours and raided their tent the next day (11 October). Describing himself as the leader of the attacking party, he is saying that he had crossed ‘Chamerar Gali’ at around 4.30 pm.

The militants claimed that they took hand-written identity cards, bags containing instant noodles, wafers and some personal kits from constable Harjit Singh. At the same time, quoting an army source, the newspaper writes that the army has described this video as a ‘childish attempt of propaganda’.

So far, nine soldiers of the Indian Army have been martyred during this encounter that started in the forests of Poonch and Rajouri and the army is still conducting a search operation.

Jaswinder Singh, Mandeep Singh, Gajan Singh, Saraj Singh, and Vaishakh H were among the soldiers killed in the incident of 11 October. On October 14, the army had spoken of recovering the bodies of Subedar Ajay Singh and Naik Harendra Singh. While in another encounter, Riflemen Vikram Singh and Yogmber Singh were martyred.

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