Army patrol fired upon near Aman Setu, JCO killed

Fayaz Bukhari
SRINAGAR, Oct 28: A Junior Commissioned Officer (JCO) of Army was killed near the Aman Setu crossing point on the Line of Control (LoC) in Uri when an Army patrol was fired upon early today.
A Srinagar based Defence spokesman said that an area domination patrol of Army came under fire early today near the LoC in Uri sector in which one JCO was killed.
Sources said that an Army patrol of 8 Kumaon was fired upon when it was patrolling at night near the LoC between Kaman post near Aman Setu and Bhim Post.
The Army patrol came under fire at around mid night and the patrol also returned the fire. The firing continued for almost two hours during which one JCO, subedar Prakash Chand was killed.
Additional troops were immediately rushed to the area to respond to the firing. Searches of the area were conducted in the morning. However, no one was found in the area. The Army concluded that fire had come from across the LoC.
Sources, however, said that militant attack on the Army patrol can’t be ruled out. They said that firing on the Army patrol took place from Riwand Nallah near the LoC. Army is looking at the circumstances under which the Army patrol was fired upon.
This is the second time this year that an Army patrol came under fire in Uri sector of Baramulla district. Last time on July 9 this year, an Army patrol was fired upon in Rustum area of Hajipeer sector near the LoC in which Havaldar Karki was killed.
And despite the killing of JCO and tension near the LoC crossing point, the Kaarwan-e-Aman (Peace Bus) between Srinagar-Muzaffarabad plied normally.
The buses from the both the sides came right near the Aman Setu and the passengers crossed the Peace Bridge as usual but tension prevailed in the area as the JCO who was killed in overnight firing belonged to the Aman Setu post.
This is for the first time since the trans-LoC Srinagar-Muzaffarabad road was re-opened in April 2005 for traffic that the firing on Army took place near the Aman Setu in which an Army personal lost his life.
Every Monday the passengers of the trans-LoC Peace Bus cross the Aman Setu while trucks carrying goods from Muzaffarabad and Srinagar cross the bridge four days a week.
In the meantime, militants hurled a grenade at Shiraz Cinema, housing two India Reserve Police (IRP) units, in Khanyar area of Srinagar but the device failed to explode.
Police said stones were pelted on Shiraz Cinema by unidentified persons late last evening. During an inspection of the compound area, the security forces found an unexploded grenade, believed to have been hurled by the militants during the stone-pelting.
Police said that a bomb disposal squad was rushed to the spot and the explosive was removed. “It was taken to an isolated place, where it was defused.

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