Srinagar- In what seemed to be like a scene from a Bollywood movie, unidentified militants on Tuesday made an abortive bid to snatch a rifle of a CRPF jawan by throwing chilli powder in his eyes in South Kashmir.
The broad daylight attack took place at Reshi Bazar in the main town of Anantnag district around Tuesday afternoon. Unknown militants threw chilli powder at a CRPF personnel, who was performing duty at the gate of a Kashmiri Pandit family, reports said.
Under attack, the CRPF man raised an alarm following which his colleagues, including policemen present, rushed to the spot and foiled an attempt of militants who managed to flee from the spot.
According to CRPF, today’s chilli attack on its men in Anantnag is the first of its kind in the recent past.
“The attack has failed miserably. And it’s a clear sign that the insurgency is significantly tailing off. The available data paints a very clear image of the falling militant recruitment rate. Several proscribed outfits have now grown frustrated with the intensified anti-insurgency operations,” CRPF spokesperson, Junaid Khan told Kashmir Observer.
“Their cadres have diminished, they have no weapons & firearms left to fight, their nefarious means to recruit local youth has been crippled by armed forces and subsequently, to vent out their anguish, they’ve now resorted to brainwashing and forcing a few youngsters, who are also known as hybrid militants, into carrying out such attacks against CRPF personnel who are posted as the first line of security in Kashmir,” he added.
The spokesperson further said that there’s absolutely no way that militants will let peace prevail in the Valley. He said that the CRPF personnel stationed at various junctions across Kashmir are there to maintain law and order but taking advantage of a certain group’s resentment, these militants feel emboldened and try to disrupt peace.
“See, chilli is something which anyone can carry with himself and it becomes very difficult for jawans to identify a lone criminal among the herd. However, we’re always alert. This can easily be derived from today’s attack as the attacker’s bid to snatch CRPF personnel’s weapon was foiled by other alert troopers. This attack is quite visibly an outcome of various militant organizations’ failed bid to disrupt peace in Kashmir,” Khan said.
Interestingly, the chilli attack by militants on CRPF personnel comes at a time when the security agencies have flagged concerns over the use of hi-tech gadgets by militants to escape from the cordon and search operations.
According to a recent report by PTI, fifteen signatures of Iridium satellite phones, used by the US-led allied forces in Afghanistan, and Wi-Fi-enabled thermal imagery devices that help a militant to escape security cordons especially during night have been found in the militancy-hit Kashmir Valley.
Grenade Lobbed On CRPF Bus In Kulgam
Meanwhile in a separate incident in South Kashmir militants on Tuesday lobbed a grenade on a bus carrying CRPF personnel in Kulgam district.
The militants hurled the grenade at the CRPF bus at Brazloo in Kulgam, the officials said.
They said the grenade landed and exploded on the roadside and did not cause any damage.
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