New Delhi: Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Friday took stock of the security situation in Jammu and Kashmir in the wake of a series of targeted killings in the Valley, officials said.
National Security Advisor (NSA) Ajit Doval, Army Chief General Manoj Pande, and Lieutenant Governor of Jammu and Kashmir Manoj Sinha were among those who attended the meeting.
The home minister reviewed the security situation in Jammu and Kashmir, a ministry official said.
Security arrangements for the upcoming Amarnath Yatra also figured in the meetings, the official said.
The meeting came after militants carried out a series of targeted killings in the Kashmir Valley that included non-Muslims, security personnel, an artist and local civilians.
Two persons — a bank employee and a brick kiln labourer — were killed in Kashmir on Thursday while another labourer was injured in two separate incidents.
The bank manager was the ninth and the labourer was the 10th targeted killing in Kashmir since May 01. A woman teacher hailing from the Samba district of the Jammu region was shot dead by militants at a school in south Kashmir’s Kulgam district on Tuesday.
On May 18, militants had entered a wine shop at Baramulla in north Kashmir and threw a grenade, killing one person from the Jammu region and injuring three others.
Policeman Saifullah Qadri was shot dead outside his residence in Srinagar on May 24 while television artiste Amreen Bhat was gunned down in Budgam two days later.
Scores of Kashmiri Pandits, who were employed under a prime minister’s package in 2012, have been staging protests threatening mass exodus since the killing of Rahul Bhat, who was shot dead by militants on May 12 in the Chadoora area of Budgam district in central Kashmir.
The high-level meeting chaired by Shah was the second such exercise in less than a fortnight.
Union Home Secretary Ajay Kumar Bhalla, Director of Intelligence Bureau Arvind Kumar, Director General of Central Reserve Police Force Kuldiep Singh, Border Security Force chief Pankaj Singh, and Jammu and Kashmir Director General of Police Dilbag Singh among other key officials took part in the meeting.
Earlier, Shah had an informal meeting with LG Manoj Sinha, Arvind Kumar, Secretary of RAW Samant Goel and DGP of Jammu and Kashmir Dilbagh Singh.
Meanwhile, amid a growing demand for shifting Kashmiri Pandit employees to safer places after a series of targeted killings, the Jammu and Kashmir administration Friday made it clear the employees would not be moved out of the Valley but transferred to safer locations.
Officials also said the recent escalation in “targeted terrorist violence” would not lead to any change in plans for holding the annual Amarnath Yatra which is scheduled from June 30-August 11.
The assertion comes in the wake of a spate of incidents which included targeted killings of civilians.
One of the victims was Rahul Bhat. Bhat was a Kashmiri Pandit migrant who was employed under a prime minister’s package. He was shot dead by militants on May 12 at his office in Chadoora of Budgam in central Kashmir.
His killing sparked demonstrations by around 6,000 employees at various places who demanded their relocation outside the Valley.
But officials Friday argued that the Jammu and Kashmir administration cannot be a party to any “ethnic-cleansing” scripted from across the border by agreeing to the demand of Kashmiri Pandit employees to be shifted out of the Valley.
They also asserted “the killing of soft targets by terror groups won’t deter them from holding the annual Amarnath Yatra”.
Over two lakh pilgrims have already registered themselves for the annual pilgrimage, they said.
“The terror groups working at the behest of countries fomenting terrorism are worried by the return of normalcy in the Valley and therefore, soft targets are picked up to instill fear among the masses and create chaos,” they said.
The J&K administration is not going to be bogged down by this, they said, exuding confidence that the security forces would put an end to these targeted killings like they did in October 2021 when militants carried out a spate of targeted attacks including on prominent chemist M L Bindroo and a Sikh teacher.
The officials said the Amarnath Yatra was a symbol of Kashmir’s composite culture and will go on despite some threat perception which will be handled.
They said “these targeted killings show that terror groups’ ability to strike at protected targets has shrunk, and therefore soft targets are being approached.”
They said there was an evil design behind these targeted killings and cautioned that the attacks were not to create a division between Hindus and Muslims but to establish one “nizam” in the Valley.
For this they can kill anyone who doesn’t follow their line, they said, pointing out that Muslims have also been killed by these groups.
The officials, while talking about prospects of holding elections in the union territory, said this was a decision that would be taken by the Election Commission only.
