Militant killed in Ganderbal was right hand of Riyaz Naikoo: DGP Dilbag

Srinagar: Director General of Police, Jammu and Kashmir, Dilbagh Singh on Wednesday said that the militant killed in Nunar, Ganderbal incident was the “right hand” of slain Hizbul Mujahideen chief operational commander, Reyaz Naikoo, and had been working as an Over Ground Worker before joining the Hizb outfit few months ago.

“Yesterday, evening, militants targeted the BJP vice president Ghulam Qadir in Nunner area of Ganderbal. Qadir is a protected person with two PSOs. One of his PSOs Altaf Hussain retaliated and killed one militant but he sustained bullet wounds. Unfortunately, the brave cop lost his life while saving the protected person,” DGP told reporters on the sidelines of wreath laying ceremony of slain cop, Altaf Hussain, in Srinagar.

He said the slain militant killed in retaliation by the PSO Altaf Hussain was the close aide of slain Hizb chief operational commander Reyaz Naikoo. “He has been identified as Shabir Ahmed of Awantipora Pulwama. He was the right hand of Naikoo and was working as OGW for Hizb for a long time. He had joined militancy just a few months ago and was associated with Hizbul Mujahideen outfit,” DGP Singh said.

“Shabir was tasked to carry out target hitting of BJP leader in Ganderbal.” he added.

On asking the DGP Singh how an active militant from South Kashmir was able to reach Ganderbal, the DGP said that for a militant it’s not a big deal to travel from one district to another.

On the recent highway attacks on the government forces, DGP Singh said that drones and other technical support is being used to monitor the militant movement on highways. “Drones were earlier used as well. We are using other technical support to monitor militant movement on the highways. In many cases, we have killed the attackers on highways in counter attacks,” he said. KNO