MHA holds high-level meet on J-K security

By Rajnish Singh
New Delhi [India], December 23 (ANI): Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Thursday conducted a high-level meeting on the security situation in Jammu and Kashmir in the wake of recent targeted killings reported from the region, sources said.
Union Home Secretary Ajay Bhalla chaired the meeting here at his North Block office with the top brass of Police and Intelligence agencies personnel as well as senior Home Ministry officials responsible to look after security scenarios in Jammu and Kashmir.
In the meeting that was held in the first half of the day and lasted for over an hour, the Home Secretary is learnt to have discussed the current security scenario in the Valley where several targeted attacks by terrorists on Jammu and Kashmir Police (JKP) personnel, armed forces, and civilians were reported.
The meeting was both in physical and digital mode and Directors General of various Central Armed Police Forces (CAPFs) and their representatives, Jammu and Kashmir Director General of Police (DGP) Dilbag Singh and senior officials in Intelligence Bureau (IB) took part in the meeting both via video conferencing and physically.
It is learnt that the functioning of the newly created State Investigation Agency (SIA) in Jammu and Kashmir on the lines of the National Investigation Agency (NIA) was taken up in the meeting. The SAI is a nodal agency Jammu and Kashmir for coordinating with the NIA and other Central agencies "to take measures as may be necessary for speedy and effective investigation and prosecution of militancy-related cases".
Besides, various issues related to modernization of Police Stations and Police Posts and misuse of certain prisons by the terrorists were also discussed.
The meeting comes in the wake of recent attacks on civilians, Jammu and Kashmir Police and security personnel in the union territory.
In the recent one, terrorists on Wednesday shot dead a civilian and injured a policeman in two separate incidents within minutes in Kashmir valley. While the civilian was gunned down in the Nawakadal locality of the city, a police assistant sub-inspector (ASI) was injured in the Bijbehara area of south Kashmir's Anantnag district.
Earlier this month, three personnel of Jammu and Kashmir Police died and 11 were injured after two terrorists attacked a police bus near a police camp at Zewan on the outskirts of Srinagar. In the incident, the terrorists had opened fire on the bus in the high-security area that houses several camps of various security forces. It was the second major terror attack in the Kashmir Valley after the recent spate of targeted attacks on migrant workers and members of the minority communities.
Earlier, two policemen were killed as terrorists opened fire at a police team in Kashmir's Bandipora district.
October saw 41 killings in militancy-related incidents, including 20 terrorists, nine soldiers and 12 civilians. (ANI)