‘Journalist’ among two killed in J&K encounter, IG says ‘clear case of misuse of media’

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IGP Kashmir Vijay Kumar said that one of the deceased militants, Rayees Bhat, was carrying a media identity card indicating a “clear case of misuse of media”. The photo on the identity card, purportedly found on the militant, identifies him as the Editor-in-Chief of an online news portal, ‘Valley News Service’, in Anantnag.

“It is pertinent to mention that Rayees Ahmad was earlier working as a journalist and was running online news portal ‘Valley News Service’ in Anantnag. He had joined terrorist ranks in year 2021 and was wanted by law in cases related to terror crime. He was also responsible for creating terror among the locals and had been coercing innocent citizens to sympathise with anti-national elements,” a police statement said.

In August 2021, when Bhat went missing, his family had made appeals to the police as well as the general public for him to return home.

A person familiar with Bhat’s work said on condition of anonymity that he “had no formal training in journalism but had started the website for information dissemination. The portal itself is not very prominent outside of the district.”

Police said that incriminating materials, arms & ammunition were recovered from the site of the encounter. All the recovered materials have been taken into case records for further investigation.

IGP Kashmir Vijay Kumar said that the militants “were planning to attack soft targets in Srinagar and timely action by Srinagar Police led to their elimination.”

He added the number of terrorists operating in Kashmir Valley has seen a decline as “we are intensifying the operations to make the valley terror free.”

Meanwhile, a case under relevant sections of law has been registered and investigation has been initiated.