Srinagar: A fierce gunbattle broke out late on Saturday evening in Tral on the city outskirts here after security forces cordoned off a house where three to five top Hizbul Mujahideen militants were holed up.
Officials sources said special forces of army were deployed to carry out a combing operation in the area.
Curfew has been clamped in this area, 10 km from here, as protesters had gathered near the encounter site, they said.
Half of the house was brought down by the security forces but militants were still firing on them.
Poster boy of banned Hizbul Mujahideen terror outfit Burhan Wani belong to this area.
Meanwhile, Jammu and Kashmir Police foiled an attempt by an army jawan to flee with a truck and a weapon from the Udhampur -based Northern Command, and recovered the vehicle and weapon though the accused soldier managed to escape.
“We got a message from the army that one jawan has fled with an army truck and weapon from Northern Command area ,” Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP), Kathua, Pawan Parihar said on Saturday.
“We deployed police for checking at Lakhanpur interstate toll plaza and finally in the late night, we were able to recover the truck and weapon but the jawan gave the slip and escaped,” he said.
The army truck and carbine weapon has been handed over to the Military Police and a case has been registered by police in Udhampur, the officer said.
The investigation is on along with efforts to trace the jawan, he said.
In another incident, a service rifle of a CRPF jawan on duty was on Saturday snatched allegedly by unidentified people during a clash between security forces and protesters in south Kashmir’s Pulwama district, police said.
Although there was no report of any casualty in the clashes, the official said an INSAS rifle of a CRPF jawan was reportedly snatched and taken away by some youth. (PTI)
