Records show J-K police had big role in 2000 fake encounter

J-K police too played a major role in fake encounters.

While the CBI has chargesheeted five Army officers, including a Brigadier, for the killing of five civilians in a fake encounter in Pathribal six years ago, the fact remains that the J-K police too played a major role in the encounter. This is what The Indian Express found out:

• The FIR filed by the 7 Rashtriya Rifles described the fake encounter as a “joint operation” with J-K Police

• Daily diary reports of Sherbagh police post clearly indicates that on the orders of the then Anantnag SSP, Farooq Khan, a SoG (Special Operations Group) party was sent for a “secret operation”. In fact, ASI Bashir Ahmad wrote about the “secret mission” in his departure report

• Tajinder Singh, then DySP (SOG) Anantnag, and Col Ajay Saxena explained the “joint RR-police operation” with the help of an extensive site map to then Union Home Minister L K Advani, giving graphic details about the killing of five Pak-based Lashkar terrorists who were behind the massacre of Sikhs in Chittisinghpora

• Advani congratulated the police and Army for the operation and even had a group picture taken with the police and Army officers. Cash awards were also announced for the officers

• Kashmi Zonal Police headquarters issued a press statement, claiming that five Lashkar terrorists responsible for the Chittisinghpora massacre had been eliminated in a joint RR-Police operation. The then Union Home Secretary Kamal Pandey gave a similar statement at a press conference in New Delhi

• Mohammad Yaqoob Wagay alias Chatti Guru, a local milkman, was picked up a few days after the March 20, 2000 Chittisinghpora massacre by the police for allegedly “guiding” the killers to the village. Union Home Secretary Kamal Pandey announced his arrest in New Delhi and the police and RR claimed that based on Wagay’s “leads”, they had killed five Lashkar terrorists

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• Nine months later, Anantnag Police admitted that the police had no corroborative evidence to chargesheet Wagay and that they have reduced the charge from multiple murder to “trying to breach peace (CrPC 107/151)”

• Once the CBI established that the five killed in the joint police-RR operation were actually civilians, the question is: who picked up the civilians? The J&K Police itself established that a Maruti van was used to ferry one of the victims, Zahoor Ahmad Dal, from Anantnag.

This van was a seized vehicle, in the custody of the police.

Anantnag SSP during encounter gets clean chit, new posting

NEW DELHI: After remaining under suspension for three years in connection with the Pathribal killings, Farooq Khan was posted last week to Rajouri as SSP. An IPS officer of the 1994 batch, Khan received a clean chit from CBI last year but the Mufti Sayeed government refused to to reinstate him.

—PTI