A day after the demise of one Indian Air Force personnel and the injury of four others during a surprise attack on an IAF convoy in Jammu and Kashmir’s Poonch district, Security personnel on Sunday morning spread out to pursue militants involved in the assault, officials disclosed.
The combing operation was executed to trace the terrorists as security forces have established checkpoints and are conducting inspections in the area. Additional forces of the Indian Army arrived at the Jarra Wali Gali (JWG) in Poonch late on Saturday night. The incident unfolded at Sanai village, leading to the injured personnel being promptly transported to the Command Hospital in Udhampur, where one of them succumbed to his injuries.
Subsequent to the attack, the local Rashtriya Rifles unit commenced cordon and search operations in the vicinity, with assistance from the Army and police, in order to apprehend the perpetrators. The IAF authenticated the incident via a tweet, asserting that the targeted convoy had been secured, and highlighting the ongoing investigation. “An Indian Air Force vehicle convoy was assaulted by terrorists in the Poonch district,” officials stated. The vehicles have been secured within the air base in the general vicinity near Shahsitar.
The ambush on the convoy occurred near Shahsitar in the Surankote area around 6.15 pm as the troops were en route to their base at Sanai Top, according to officials. They reported that five soldiers sustained injuries in the gunfire by the terrorists and were subsequently evacuated to a hospital, where one of the critically injured personnel succumbed to injuries.
“In the ensuing firefight with terrorists, the Air Warriors retaliated by returning fire. Consequently, five IAF personnel sustained gunshot wounds and were evacuated to the nearest military hospital for urgent medical attention. One Air Warrior succumbed to his injuries later. Further operations are being conducted by the local security forces,” the IAF posted on X.
Previously, the IAF, while confirming the attack, had posted: “An Indian Air Force vehicle convoy was targeted by militants in the Poonch district of J-K, near Shahsitar. Cordon and search operations are currently underway in the area by local military units. The convoy has been secured, and further investigation is in progress.”
The vehicles were in transit towards nearby Sanai Top in the Surankote area of the district, officials said, suspecting the involvement of the same group of terrorists who perpetrated an ambush on the troops in adjacent Bufliaz on December 21 last year, resulting in the death of four soldiers and injuries to three others. The Army truck bore the brunt of the gunfire by the terrorists, armed with AK assault rifles, who are believed to have fled into the nearby forests, they added.
Reinforcements from the Army and police were dispatched to the area, and a large-scale search and cordon operation was launched to locate and neutralize the terrorists, officials stated. Police, aided by paramilitary forces, conducted searches in Poonch town since Friday following intelligence about the movement of suspicious individuals. However, no arrests were made during the operation, the officials confirmed.
The latest incident in the Pir Panjal region followed the assassination of a government employee, Mohd Razaq, brother of an Army personnel, by terrorists at village Kunda Top in Rajouri’s Shahdra area on April 22, and a village defence guard, Mohd Sharief, in Basantgarh area of Udhampur on April 28.
Police have released images of two Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorists, including suspected Pakistani national Abu Hamza, involved in Razaq’s murder and announced a cash reward of Rs 10 lakh on his head. The Bufliaz ambush in December last year occurred weeks after a major firefight in the Dharmsal belt of Bajimaal forest in Rajouri, resulting in the death of five Army personnel, including two captains, a month earlier.
Two terrorists, including a senior commander of LeT identified as Quari, were also killed in the two-day long firefight. Quari was purported to be the mastermind behind several attacks, including the killing of 10 civilians and five Army personnel in the district. The stretch between Dhera Ki Gali and Bufliaz on the boundary of Rajouri and Poonch is densely forested and leads to Chamrer forest and then Bhata Dhurian forest, where five soldiers were killed in an ambush on an Army vehicle on April 20 last year.
In May last year, five more Army personnel were killed and a major-rank officer was injured in Chamrer forest during an anti-terrorist operation. A foreign terrorist was also killed in the operation. In 2022, five Army personnel were killed when terrorists carried out a suicide attack on their camp at Pargal in Darhal area of Rajouri district. Both the terrorists involved in the attack were eliminated.
In 2021, nine soldiers were killed in two separate attacks by terrorists in the forested region. While five Army personnel, including a junior commissioned officer (JCO), were killed on October 11 in Chamrer, a JCO and three soldiers were killed on October 14 in a nearby forest.