Author: Press Trust of India
Publication: www.expressindia.com
Date: June 29, 2004
URL: http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=33196
In a major breakthrough, a Lashker-e-Toiba
module was busted in Srinagar with the killing of two militants and arrest
of 18 who had planned attacks on Bombay Stock Exchange, strategic places
in Delhi and elsewhere and had links with the four militants killed in
an encounter in Ahmedabad on June 15, a top police official said on Tuesday.
The module had planned to target
the Bombay Stock Exchange, some strategic places in Delhi, Ahmedabad and
Pune, top political leaders and police officers, Director General of Police
Gopal Sharma said.
The Special Investigation Team of
Srinagar district police also found a link between the module and the four
LeT militants killed in Ahmedabad.
One of the four militants killed
in Ahmedabad, Babar, a Pakistani national, was sent from Srinagar, the
DGP said.
"We have come across some links
between this group and four LeT militants killed in an encounter with Gujarat
police. We are going to probe it further", he said.
The militants arrested from various
parts of the city in the past three days were involved in several high
profile killings including that of Maulvi Mushtaq Ahmed, uncle of Hurriyat
leader Mirwaiz Umer Farooq, blasts and suicide attacks, he said.
The DGP said of the 20 militants
arrested, two, both Pakistani nationals, were killed when a police team
leading them for recoveries came under fire from a hideout in Rawalpora
area on Monday night. Five policemen were also injured in the shootout.
With this breakthrough, Sharma said
that the security forces have not only worked out several cases that took
place over the past one year but also prevented many others, which the
module had planned.
On the modus operandi of the module,
the DGP said Hizbul Mujahideen, Al Umar Mujahideen and LeT had for the
past six months pooled their resources including manpower, information
and weaponry to work under the new umbrella organisation called save Kashmir
movement.
The outfit dominant in a certain
area would help out logistically other outfits to carry out attacks, he
said.
Asked if busting of the module signaled
an end to the presence of militants in the city, Sharma said some militants
may still be around but we expect to go further in our probe.
Inspector General of Police K Rajendra
Kumar said one of the arrested militants was working as constable in the
auxiliary police and has been dismissed.
Sharma said Jammu and Kashmir police
was synergising its operations with its counterparts in other states and
exchange of special investigation teams would be carried out on reciprocal
basis.
On the Ahmedabad encounter, the
DGP, however, denied that J&K police had tipped off its Gujarat counterpart
about the four LeT militants.
