Anantnag terror attack: 5 CRPF personnel martyred, 1 terrorist gunned down

Five Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel were martyred and four other security personnel suffered injuries on Wednesday when terrorists carried out an attack on a busy road in Jammu and Kashmir's Anantnag district. According to the latest updates, one terrorist has also been neutralised by the security forces. 

3 injured personnel have been shifted Army's Base Hospital in Srinagar. An AK series assault rifle was recovered from him, they said.     

Those who were martyred are - 1. ASI Ramesh Kumar r/o Jhajjar, Haryana; 2. ASI Nirod Sarma R/O Nalbari, Assam; 3. CT Satendra Kumar r/o Muzaffarnagar UP; 4. CT Mahesh Kr Kushwaha r/o Gazipur UP; 5. CT Sandeep yadav r/o Dewas MP

According to officials, two masked terrorists attacked a patrol party of the CRPF on the busy KP Road in Anantnag with automatic rifles. They also hurled grenades at the patrol team.

WATCH: Al-Umar Mujahideen claims responsibility of Anantnag terror attack

Pro-Pakistan terrorist group Al Umar Mujahideen has claimed responsibility for the Anantnag attack. However, police said that they believe its handiwork of Jaish-e-Mohammed. 

The Station House Officer of Anantnag Police Station, Arshad Ahmed, was also injured in the attack and has been shifted to Srinagar for treatment, they said.    

"Terrorists came riding a motorcycle and hurled a grenade and fired indiscriminately towards joint police and CRPF party who were on regular law and order duty. In this firing, 8 CRPF jawans 1 SHO and a lady got injured," a senior police official said.

A joint team of the bravo company of CRPF's 116th battalion and state police were deployed for a picket duty in the area when the attack took place. 

The attacks comes less than three weeks before the commencement of the annual Amaranth yatra to the cave shrine in south Kashmir Himalayas.   

Jammu and Kashmir Police had shared an intelligence input about a possible terror strike on security forces around the general bus stand which is located on KP road.    

Though Al-Umar Mujahideen, a defunct terror group, has claimed responsibility for the strike, officials, however, said that it was a handiwork of Jaish-e-Mohammed.   

Pilgrims travelling to the cave shrine have to pass through the stretch of the road where Wednesday's attack took place. The yatra is scheduled to begin on July 1 and culminate on August 15.    

A major terror attack took place on Amarnath pilgrims in July 2017 when eight of them were killed by Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorists who opened indiscriminate firing on their bus at Khanabal. 

With PTI Inputs