 Early Times Report
Jammu, Aug 6: A militant was arrested and eight grenades were recovered from him near Green Belt park in Gandhi Nagar, foiling a major terror plot to trigger blasts in Jammu or in the national capital during the Independence Day celebrations next week.
"A Kashmiri youth was arrested in possession of 8 grenades from Gandhi Nagar area, last night. He was carrying the cache of grenades to Delhi to hand them over to someone and they could have been used to disrupt 15th August celebrations in Delhi," Dr SD Singh Jamwal, IGP Jammu Zone said during a press conference.
Flanked by Deputy Inspector General (DIG) of Police Jammu-Kathua-Samba Range, Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Jammu Vivek Gupta, in-charge SP South and SP Operation Vinay Kumar, DySP Mohd Rafiq Manhas-SDPO South and Inspector Sunil Jasrotia-SHO Gandhi Nagar, IGP said that acting on intelligence inputs, police intercepted a bus in Gandhi Nagar area here late last night and arrested a youth from Kashmir who was carrying eight hand grenades.
Police identified the arrested militant as Arfan Wani, a resident of Awantipora in Pulwama district of South Kashmir. Eight live hand grenades and Rs 60,000 in cash were recovered from his possession, the officer said.
They could have been used in Delhi or parts of Jammu on the eve of Independence Day. With his arrest, a major terror plot has been foiled," Jamwal said.
"We are interrogating this terrorist, who belongs to Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind outfit headed by Zakir Musa but he was in touch with the number two named Rehan," he added.
The latest incident comes close on the heels of a grenade attack on Jammu Bus Stand on May 24 in which four people, including three policemen, were injured.
A police sources pleading anonymity said that terrorists from Kashmir are regularly travelling unchecked all the way from Kashmir to Jammu.
"We all know that there are only two routes: NH 44 and Mughal Road that connect Kashmir with Jammu. Therefore, these militants travelling all the way from Kashmir to Jammu with arms and ammunition raise a serious question mark on the security grid," a police source said pleading anonymity.
"One cannot rule out the possibilities of moles in the system, who are helping them to reach Jammu," the officer added.
Police and other security agencies are alert in the wake of intelligence inputs that the Kashmiri militants of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM), and Hizbul Mujahideen plan to carry out terror strikes in Jammu and New Delhi on the occasion of Independence Day on August 15.
After the arrest, a high alert has been made in Jammu.
However, Police is doing the interrogation to the militant and trying to extract the details about the plans and also about his contacts in the city and also outskirts.
Meanwhile, a team of Delhi Police's Special Cell is in Jammu and will be questioning Arfan Wani. |
