NSG, NIA teams to join investigation in Pulwama attack
New Delhi, Feb 14: Experts of the anti-terror commando force National Security Guard (NSG) and investigators of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) are being sent to Jammu and Kashmir to join the probe into today’s Fidayeen attack, officials said Thursday.
The decision was taken in view of the high number of casualties in the worst militant strike in the state since the Uri attack in 2016.
An NIA team with forensic experts is being sent to Srinagar to assist Jammu and Kashmir Police in forensic evaluation of the scene of crime, a Home ministry official said.
Explosive specialists of the Black Cat commando force NSG will also join in the investigation into the attack, another official said.
Blast was heard 10 km away: Locals
Srinagar: The scene of devastation and destruction caused on Thursday by the suicide car bomb attack that killed at least 44 paramilitary personnel sent chills down the spine of unsuspecting locals.
The explosive used in the attack was so strong that the blast was heard from 10-12 km away, including some parts of Srinagar adjoining the Pulwama district, locals said.
Body parts of the militant Adil Ahmad, who carried out the attack, and the CRPF personnel killed in the attack were strewn on the Srinagar-Jammu highway, where the incident happened.
Some of the bodies were so badly blown up that officials feel it may take some time to identity them.
This was the first suicide car bomb strike in Kashmir since the 2001 attack on the Jammu and Kashmir Legislative Assembly that left 41 persons, including three suicide attackers, dead.
There was nothing at the scene of the incident to suggest which type of vehicle was used to carry out the attack except the mangled heap of iron of the bus that was the target.
As soon as the explosion took place, people started running for safety. The shopkeepers at Lethpora market, which is less than 300 metres from the scene of the attack, downed their shutters and fled.
