Militants visit senior cop’s home in south, leave with a stern message

In a first-of-its-kind incident that has sent shockwaves through the J&K Police circles, a group of about a dozen heavily armed militants Saturday entered the home of a senior police officer in south of Kashmir and ransacked personal property of the officer and his family worth lakhs.
Well-placed sources say that a group of militants with automatic rifles entered the house of one senior officer whose lives in Shopian district of South Kashmir.
Once inside the premises, the suspected militants, as per the sources, asked the family members to warn the police officer to quit his job or face the consequences.
“They told one of his (police officers) relatives that since the police was destroying property of the militants and those who were providing them shelter, there was bound to be retaliation,” said another Police officer who was aware of the development.
Sources also said that while the suspected militants destroyed personal belongings including electronic items, no member of the family was harmed of threatened by the gunmen.
Confirming the incident, many senior J&K Police officers said that Saturday’s incident was an offshoot of the events that started in October 2016 when the militants are believed to have started a mass contact programme in South Kashmir following the groundswell in their favour post Burhan Wani’s death.
“We are well aware of militants in South Kashmir, particularly in Shopian and Pulwama areas, starting a mass contact programme with the family members of Policemen who hailed from South Kashmir particularly in far flung areas. The militants with guns would visit the Policeman’s house and very calmly try to counsel the members that their son should either give up the uniform or not get involved in any anti-militancy activity,” a top Police officer told Kashmir Post.
He added that this was a way of building up social pressure on police families while at the same time giving out a signal that militants were aware of the weaknesses that serving policemen had.
Many police officers privately admit that events like these can have a cascading affect on the morale of the policemen as like any other human being, cops too value the safety of their family members.
“In South Kashmir, things are very volatile. This incident will certainly build more pressure on us. We expect more such actions by the militants in near future,” said one of the officers.
As expected the family of the police officer who received the warning is distraught and unable to figure out what to do next.
“Only few years back there were celebrations in the village when the officer cleared the exams and now he is being warned to quit his job,” said one of the officers’ neighbours.
DIG South Kashmir SP Pani also confirmed that the incident took place in Shopian.
“Yes the incident took place. That’s all I can say,” Pani told Kashmir Post.