SRI NAGAR: One youth died in the clashes between locals and security forces following LeT chief Abu Dujana’s death. The deceased was identified as Firdous Ahmad.
The IGP Kashmir termed Dujana’s killing as a major jolt to Lashkar and big achievement for security forces.
Sources said Dujana had married a girl from Pulwama last year and ever since his marriage, his movement was tracked and monitored by the security forces.
Dujana, who had taken over as LeT’s Kashmir chief in November 2015 after the death of his predecessor Abu Qasim, was carrying a bounty of Rs 15 lakh on his head. Police handed over body of the local militant Arif to the locals for burial but did not hand over the body of Abu Dujana.
A police officer said he was categorized as A++ militant. “He had been active for about seven years and was among the longest surviving foreign militants in Kashmir”.
“Dujana had infiltrated into the Valley in 2010 and had been active since then. He served as deputy of Abu Qasim before taking over as LeT’s Kashmir chief after his killing.
He was involved in planning of almost all the major militant attacks in Valley including the attack on CRPF convoy at Pampore area in south Kashmir’s Pulwama district last year in which eight CRPF men were killed and about a dozen injured and the attack on BSF convoy at Udhampur in which two border guards and a militant were killed and 10 others injured,” he said.
He said Dujana was also instrumental in recruiting the local youth into LeT. He said that Dujana, a resident of Gilgit-Baltistan, had escaped from about a dozen security forces operations in the past, the recent one being on July 19.
Sources said Abu Ismail, who was allegedly the mastermind of July 10 attack on Amarnath yatris, is likely to take over as LeT’s Kashmir chief.
After Dujana’s killing, clashes broke out between youth and security personnel at many places in Srinagar, south Kashmir and north Kashmir. The police and paramilitary fired pellets and tear smoke shells to disperse the protestors, who pelted stones on them. Over a dozen persons were injured in the clashes.
As tension gripped Valley, authorities suspended mobile internet services and closed all educational institutions.The separatist leader Syed Ali Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Mohammad Yasin Malik, have called for Valley-wide shutdown on Wednesday to protest militant and civilian killings.
In view of the shutdown call, authorities have ordered closure of all educational institutions in the Valley, an official said.