Bilal Handoo
SRINAGAR
Abu Qasim
For the day, Kashmir police chief, SJM Gillani sounded like the former police chief, Kuldeep Khoda while briefing a hurriedly-conveyed press conference in Police Control Room Thursday morning to formally declare that the ‘big fish has been finally netted’.
The Kashmir Police Chief termed gunning down of Abu Qasim as the “major success, which, he said, has “dented” the LeT operations. The same words were heard, four years ago, when Khoda being DGP commended his force for killing the then LeT commander-in-chief, Abdullah Uni. But once Uni departed, Qasim arrived, making the entire state forces to keep guessing about his whereabouts for the next four years.
Qasim’s eventful journey began immediately after Azhar Malik alias Abdullah Uni, was killed in a gunfight at Sopore’s Batpora area on September 13, 2011. Uni was the most wanted guerrilla, who had reportedly shot dead 15 persons, mostly security men, including a Major rank officer. In nine years, he had escaped 12 cordons, revived militancy in Sopore-Kupwara-Bandipore belt since 2002, established a strong militancy base in Sopore and re-organised his group with mobilization of dozens of fresh recruits. This made him the most wanted man for the security grid. When Uni was finally killed, the then DGP Khoda was a pleased chief for silencing “the most wanted militant”.
“Uni’s death rattled LeT, shrinking its base swiftly,” said a top counterinsurgent officer. “And then came another blow for LeT, five months after Uni’s killing, when his second-in-command and top wanted Pakistani militant, Abu Akash Badar was also killed in a fierce gun-battle in Sopore.”
While the twin killings in Sopore made security apparatus to feel that LeT is “done and dusted with”, the bludgeoning militant outfit was quietly regrouping itself. “It was then, Abu Qasim started infusing the lost confidence in an otherwise shattered militant outfit,” the officer said.
IGP Kashmir, SJM Gillani addressing press conference about Abu Qasim’s killing. (Photo: Bilal Bahadur/KL)
That confidence took form of the first major strike in the fall of 2012. On October 19 that year, Qasim-led group opened fire at an Army convoy near a prominent hotel in city outskirts. It was the first attack in Srinagar under a tourism boom.
The attack began Qasim’s three year’s journey, making him the mystery man, who would give slips to sleuths every time they would claim they have actually laid their hands on him. By the time Qasim struck again, he turned Highway into mortuary for eight army men, sending jitters down the security establishment.
It was June 24, 2013, and Qasim was part of the LeT squad that carried out the Fidayeen attack on army convoy at Srinagar’s Hyderpora, killing eight army men. “That Fidayeen attack simply stunned army,” a top-ranking police official admitted.
After that, a string of attack followed. “Be it 2013 attack on Police Party at Galander Pampore in which two constables of JKAP 11th Bn got killed, or 2014 attack on BSF Bus near Kadlabal Pampore leaving six personnel injured,” said SJM Gillani said, “the brain behind them was Qasim.”
Qasim was also responsible for killing a SHO Chadoora in 2013, police said. “In the same year, he killed two CRPF personnel in Pulwama. A year later, he was involved in killing of two SPOs at Court Complex Pulwama, besides killing a cop and an Army man at Qaisar Mullah Chadoora Budgam.”
But the main highlight of his career, as a militant, was his role in Udhampur attack. “He was the mastermind in that attack,” said Kashmir police chief. His name came up after the lone captured militant, Mohammed Naved alias Usman told his interrogators that it was Qasim who “received them once they crossed over, besides providing additional arms and ammunition”.
Qasim had a group of around 20 young boys, police said, both locals and Pakistanis. He had been operating from the forest areas of Shopian and Kulgam of South Kashmir, where there has been a surge in recruitment of Kashmiri youth in militant ranks recently. “The militants who would cross over to Kashmir were given shelter by him,” said a police official. “He gave instructions to them on how and where to strike.”
Once his role was established in Udhampur attack, the National Investigation Agency released his real picture and detail along with fellow militant, Abu Okasha. The NIA announced one million bounty on the 28-year-old Qasim, in addition to a similar reward already put by police. For any cop, Qasim was a prized-scalp.
Once his image was out, the crackdown on him also intensified. By August 11, he was almost caught in an encounter in the paddy fields of Rakh-e-Lajoora village of Pulwama along with Irshad Ganai. He slipped out of cordon in an injured condition. But, a month later, he lost his associate Ganie, also carrying a bounty of ten lakh rupees on his head, in a Pulwama encounter.
After Ganie’s killing, Qasim’s movements were traced in Bandipora. By the time, the ‘chase and trap’ drama unfolded on early October, Qasim gunned down the man who was after him since the Silver Star Hotel attack. After firing indiscriminately, Qasim fled, leaving state police in deep mourning for “Altaf Laptop”, credited with busting of several militant modules.
Encounter site in Kulgam. (Photo: Bilal Bahadur/KL)
By the end of October, Qasim’s end came barely five kilometres away from Zongalpore, ancestral village of Altaf in the same district. The joint party of police had laid an ambush following specific information about Qasim’s movements. “The operation began at 2 am after intelligence that Qasim of Bhawalpur Pakistan, was holed up in a house at Khandipura village in Kulgam,” police said. As gunshots started ringing the area, Qasim became the first casualty.
By Thursday morning, Gillani called it “a major success” as Qasim was directly or indirectly involved in all major LeT attacks in Kashmir over the past three years, he said. “Qasim’s killing will dent the operational capabilities of Lashkar in Kashmir and also the coordination between various militant outfits in the valley.”
But will Qasim’s killing end the Udhampur attack chapter? The IGP said, the ball is in NIA’s court. “They (NIA) have to tie the loose ends before taking the investigations to the logical conclusion.”
By Thursday afternoon, the PRO of joint party of high-profile killing, Army termed Qasim’s killing as “a major success in counter terrorist operations”. Even DGP K Rajendra couldn’t stop himself to say, “It was a great achievement for the security forces.”
In Qasim’s killing, LeT lost successor of Abdullah Uni. As police is celebrating the success, the gulf might have already created the next fugitive—because around 450 militants are active across Kashmir at the moment, police sources tell Kashmir Life.
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