SRINAGAR:The incidents of weapon-snatching are on the rise in Jammu and Kashmir, with the most recent one which was the second in the last three days, taking place in Shopian district. In Friday’s incident, militants opened fire on a policeman and made away with his service rifle.
Police sources said the militants fired at Sartaj Ahmad, who was posted at J&K Bank branch in Kachdoora village, from close range. “Before fleeing from the area, the militants snatched his SLR,” a police officer said.
The injured policeman was rushed to a hospital, where doctors termed his condition stable.
After the attack, police and paramilitary personnel cordoned off the area but couldn’t arrest anyone.
On May 26, militants decamped with a service rifle that a policeman had kept in his trunk at a hospital in Pulwama district where he was posted. In the same district, a BJP leader’s driver wrested the service rifle from the former’s Personal Security Officer on May 25. On May 11, militants killed two CRPF men in the Sangam area of Anantnag district and made away with the paramilitary personnel’s weapons.
A cop said the growing number of weapon-snatching incidents was indeed a matter of grave concern.”We have directed our men to take extra, precautionary measures and remain on alert to foil such kind of attacks by militants,” he said.
CRPF Director General Prakash Mishra had told reporters earlier this month that the force would change its deployment and patrolling strategy in the wake of the weapon-snatching incidents. “We are going to change our strategy. We don’t want them to take away our weapons. We are working on that,” he had said.