An employee was killed and two were wounded when terrorists fired at a franchise outlet of BSNL in Sopore on Monday (Press Trust of India photo)
Terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir are targeting their attacks on disrupting cellphone services, said a senior police official today.
From Sopore in northern Kashmir, the attacks have moved to neighbouring areas this week; two men have been shot because they leased their land to telecom towers, one of them has died. In the area, of the six companies that provide mobile services, only one - the state-owned BSNL - is currently working.
"There are a large number of people associated with the telecom business and it's not possible to provide individual security to all of them," said Javed Gilani, the Inspector General of the Kashmir Police to NDTV.
"Militants had installed a communication system on a telecom tower in Sopore, and after we seized it, they started pressuring people," he said.
The hi-tech communication system that was in use by the terrorists and was dismantled, was sophisticated and allowed for wider coverage while escaping the radar of security forces.
On Monday, one employee was killed and two wounded when militants fired at a franchise outlet of BSNL - the state-owned telecommunications company.
24 hours before that, two grenades were hurled at a mobile phone tower used by Vodafone, Aircel and Airtel near a police station in Sopore. One of the grenades exploded near the tower without causing any damage.
Posters last week appeared in the same area, warning phone companies to shut down their operations and landlords to end the leases.
"We warn these telecommunication companies to close all networking services, close their offices and stop recharging services as well. We warn the retailers as well to stop recharging the subscribers within seven days," the posters read.