Fayaz Bukhari
Srinagar, July 28: After a series of attacks on Telecoms carried out by militants in Srinagar city on Friday, the showrooms of various cellular operators in the capital city have been shutdown due to security concerns.
This is the second city in Kashmir valley after restive Sopore where telecom showrooms have been closed following militant threats and attacks on their facilities and infrastructure.
The Government has not taken these threats and shutdown of the telecoms seriously as no efforts have been made to convince these operators to re-open the showrooms and re-charge facilities and customers face hardships.
Militants carried out two attacks on telecom showrooms in Karan Nagar area of Srinagar on Friday by hurling grenades inside after employees and customers were asked to vacate these. The showrooms were damaged. However, there was no loss of life.
They also targeted two cell phone towers, one in Shaheed Gunj and another in Gogjibagh area of Srinagar city. Two persons were injured in these attacks that led to fear psychosis among telecom operators forcing shutdown of showrooms in Srinagar city.
The attacks in Srinagar were believed to be carried out by Lashkar-e-Islam (LeI), the breakaway group of Hizbul Mujahideen militant outfit led by Qayoom Najjar.
Earlier last week, the telecom showrooms in restive Sopore were shut down indefinitely following threats.
The telecom showrooms of various cellular operators and re-charge facilities in Sopore were shut down following fresh militant threats in the area asking them to shutdown.
It may be mentioned here that in May there was telecom shutdown for over a week in North Kashmir after majority of the towers were shutdown following militant threats and attacks. Even in Srinagar and South Kashmir the telecom operations remained affected in the first week of June for two days.
Two people associated with telecoms were killed and 4 injured in six separate attacks on the telecoms in May that led to major telecom shutdown.
However, police later provided security to the towers and assured the telecom operators security for their operations. A major crackdown was also launched against the LeI but so far security forces have not achieved any major success against them. And now they have threatened Srinagar city by carrying out attacks here.
In the meantime, three persons were detained by police’s Special Operation Group (SOG) in separate raids at Sheeri area of North Kashmir’s Baramulla district this evening.
Reports said that the SOG raided the houses of Mohammad Shafiq Rather, Mohammad Shafi Mir and Tanveer Ahmad Lone at Zogiyar village of Sheeri area of the Baramulla district. They are being questioned over the presence of militants in the area.
And security forces recovered arms and ammunition from Hatmulla area in district Kupwara last night during searches.
Reports said that last night a joint operation was conducted by JAKLI, 47 RR and Jammu and Kashmir Police in the forest of Gund Gushi in Hatmulla area of district Kupwara in which a militant hideout was busted. Security forces recovered 12 hand grenades, one pistol, two pistol magazines, one AK-rifle, three AK-56 magazines, two radio sets, two antinas of radio set, 384 AK-56 rounds, one belt of rounds and 54 rounds of M-16.
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