Terrorists Deliberately Fired At J&K Civilians In Escape Bid, Says Army

The security forces are searching for two terrorists who fired at civilians in an escape bid after they were cornered near Jammu and Kashmir's Shopian district, a defence spokesperson has said.

An army and police joint operation was launched based at 8.30 pm on Monday on intelligence information that some terrorists would be hiding in Pandoshan, some 4 km southeast of Chaudhary Gund in Shopian.

When the team was conducting the cordon-and-search operation, the terrorists started firing indiscriminately in all directions in an attempt to break through the cordon, putting civilian lives at risk, the defence spokesperson said.

"Sensing grave threat to the lives of civilians, our teams started civilian extrication from the operation site despite being heavily fired upon by the terrorists. The terrorists sensing being cornered started firing on the civilians in order to create chaos and escape," the spokesperson said.

"With complete disregard to their own safety, the security forces were successful in evacuating a majority of the civilians to a safe location; however, due to incessant and targeted firing by the terrorists, a soldier Lance Naik Sanjib Das and two civilians, Shahid Gani Dar and Suhaib Ahmad, received gunshot wounds," the spokesperson said.

All the injured three were taken to 92 Base Hospital in an army helicopter. One of the two civilians, Shahid Gani Dar, died during treatment. The other civilian and the soldier are stable.

Taking advantage of cover of darkness, the terrorists managed to escape from the operation site. The security Forces have intensified their search operations, the defence spokesperson said.