8.3.19

Grenade attack in Jammu

A teenager was killed while 32 others were injured when a grenade explosion rocked the crowded general bus stand in the heart of Jammu city.

A man with alleged links to terror outfit Hizbul Mujahideen was arrested for the attack, which is the third such strike by terrorists on Jammu bus stand since May last year and comes just three weeks after the February 14 Pulwama terror attack.

The deceased has been identified as Mohammad Shariq, a 17-year-old resident of Haridwar in Uttarakhand. Among the injured, the condition of four persons is critical.

Immediately after the blast, Jammu and Kashmir police arrested Yasir Bhat, hailing from Kulgam area of Kashmir, for allegedly lobbing the grenade.

Yasir was arrested on the basis of evidence collected from CCTV footage and oral testimony of witnesses. He had lobbed the grenade near a ticket booking counter, causing damages to a parked SRTC (state road transport corporation) bus.

Primary investigations revealed that the suspect has links with Hizbul Mujahideen. He has confessed to the crime. The district commander of Hizbul in Kulgam, Farooq Ahmed Bhatt alias Omar, had deployed him to throw the grenade at the bus stop.

Yasir, who had reached Jammu along with the grenade only on Thursday morning after he left Kulgam on Wednesday night, was fleeing back after the attack when he was arrested by alert policemen at Nagrota on the outskirts of the city.

Producing Bhat before media persons, Sinha termed his arrest as a “major breakthrough”.

Jammu and Kashmir is on high alert since the Pulwama attack that heightened tensions between India and Pakistan, leading to air strikes by the IAF on a Jaish-e-Mohammad camp in Pakistan and a subsequent retaliatory attack by the neighbouring country. Meanwhile, a Jaish militant was killed in an encounter at Kralgund in north Kashmir’s Handwara town.

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