Chandigarh: The Punjab Police on Thursday claimed to have foiled a major attempt to smuggle arms and ammunition into Kashmir to carry out militant attacks there with the arrest of two alleged Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) operatives.
Ten hand grenades, an AK-47 rifle with two magazines and 60 live cartridges were seized from the duo, identified as Aamir Hussain Wani (26) and Wasim Hassan Wani (27) of Shopian, the police said.
“The duo, actively involved in transporting automatic weapons and hand grenades from Punjab to the Kashmir Valley, were nabbed by the Pathankot police, which intercepted a truck bearing J&K registration number at a naka on the Amritsar-Jammu highway,” Punjab Director General of Police Dinkar Gupta said in a statement here.
Gupta said a search of the truck led to the weapons and ammunition, and the accused, during a preliminary investigation, revealed that they had been directed to collect the weapons from Punjab by Ishfaq Ahmed Dar, alias Bashir Ahmed Khan, a former J&K constable.
The DGP said that as per disclosures made by the two arrested LeT operatives, the weapons were to be delivered to Dar for carrying out attacks in the Valley.
Currently an active militant of the LeT in the Kashmir valley, Dar had absconded in 2017, he said.
During questioning, the duo further disclosed that they had collected the consignment from two unknown persons early Thursday morning at a pre-arranged location on the Maqboolpura-Vallah road near the vegetable market in Amritsar.
They had concealed the consignment in the truck brought ostensibly for the purpose of loading vegetables and fruits from the mandi in Amritsar, according to the DGP.
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