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| Police cracks serial killings in Sopore | | Manhunt launched for computer savvy militant | | AHMED ALI FAYYAZ
SOPORE, Jun 26: Claiming to have cracked over half-a-dozen serial killings, Jammu & Kashmir Police have launched manhunt for computer savvy militant Basharat Saleem who has been allegedly Harkat-ul-Mujahideen’s most resourceful operative and mastermind of several guerrilla attacks on both civilians as well as Police personnel in Sopore area of Baramulla district in North Kashmir.
Officials trace his escapades to his broken engagement with a young girl but describe him “today’s most wanted militant” after Harkatul Mujahideen’s Pakistani “Chief Commander of Operations” Noman. Records at Police Station Sopore reveal that Basharat Saleem had been first arrested on account of his cyber adventure of joining his lady love’s head on the body of a poorly dressed Hollywood actress. He had been booked under Information Technology Act.
After managing his release on bail, Basharat, according to Police, gained access to then Harkatul Mujahideen chief, Qari, and became an active militant. On a specific information, SOG Sopore conducted a raid and picked him up with a loaded pistol and two hand grenades from Gulzar Memoral College of Education at Noorbagh, Sopore. He was yet again released on Bail.
Long before Qari died in an encounter with security forces at Dooru last year, Basharat allegedly kidnapped a computer engineer, Umar Gul Dar, from his residential locality of Tarzoo in outskirts of the appletown and shot him dead on the orders of his organization. A murder case stands registered against him for eliminating Dar whose dead body was never traced. Officials insist that Basharat had taken most of such orders from Qari, his deputy Ali Sher and---after their death in two separate encounters—from their successor, Noman. Police officials describe all the three as Pakistani nationals and top commanders of Harkul Mujahideen.
Even as Police and security forces have launched a manhunt to arrest Basharat Saleem, they have failed to lay their hands on anybody other than his 50-year-old mother, Naseema. According to Police records, Naseema was apprehended over a specific information last month and cash worth Rs 50,000 and three hand grenades were recovered from her possession. She too secured her release after getting bail from a local court in a week’s time.
SSP Baramulla, Viplab Kumar, claims that the computer engineer, Umar Gul Dar, for whose “kidnapping and custodial death” Hurriyat leaders had initially held Police and security forces responsible, was done to death by a local group of the Harkatul guerrillas, including Basharat and Munna Janwari. An extremely dreaded militant, Janwari was killed by Police and security forces after a number of fatal attacks on Police and civilian targets two years ago.
While authorities conducted elections of massive participation late last year and a many politicians set off the chorus of demilitarization, militants surfaced yet again in Sopore. Nearly half-a-dozen civilians and Policemen were shot dead---all of them in broad daylight---in Sopore and its peripheries in the last two months. Originally a resident of Kupwara area, 50-year-old Reshma, putting up at Model Town, was the last of the lot till date, who was eliminated late in the evening.
SSP Baramulla today claimed that Sopore Police had solved the mystery of Reshma’s assassination within 10 days of occurrence. He said that in the wake of a chain of killings in Sopore in May and June, he had constituted a Police team, headed by Additional SP Sopore B S Tooti, to identify and arrest all those involved in planning and executing these murders. Two more ASPs were appointed as members of the team.
Quoting the investigation, SSP Baramulla said that Reshma had settled in Sopore and got an inferior job at a bank after some of her close relatives had been gunned down by militants in Kupwara. He said that engagement of Reshma’s daughter as an SPO was believed to have made the family suspect in the eyes of militants. On the evening of June 16th, Harkatul chief Noman assigned her killing to fellow militant Sa’ad Bhai, also a Pakistani, besides their local associate, Ehsan-ul-Haq Khanday of Noorbagh. Their local guide Shahidul Haq Dar of Model Town provided them details of Reshma’s house. While Sa’ad Bhai stood guard outside, Ehsan barged into Reshma’s house and shot her dead.
Viplab Kumar said that the special Police team succeeded in arresting Shahid-ul-Haq who spilled the beans during interrogation and helped Police in apprehending Meraj-ud-din Kachroo of Noorbagh. Kachroo too had allegedly participated in planning and executing Reshma’s assassination. SSP insisted that neither Reshma nor any other member of her family had ever worked as informer of Police or security forces.
SSP said that Police had got vital clues and almost all the cases of recent killings could be solved in a few days. Militants had spread reign of terror in Sopore area by killing Constable Ghulam Nabi Bhat of IRP 5th Bn, posted in Humhama Budgam, alongwith local vendor Mohammad Asif Dar near Bus Stand of Sopore on June 13th, head constable Mushtaq Ahmed Fafoo of IRP 7th Bn, who was a resident of Khwaja Bagh Baramulla) near Sopore on June 15th and finally Reshma on June 16th. All these came after assassination of two SPOs in Sopore outskirts.
Police have now begun search for Basharat Saleem as well as Harkatul Mujahideen’s militant Sad’ad Bhai and “Chief Commander Operations” Noman, both Pakistani nationals.
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