Nagrota encounter: Security forces launch search operation to sanitise areas along IB in J-K's Samba

Teams of police and security forces accompanied by sniffer dogs and armed with metal detectors carried out a massive search operation to sanitise areas along the International Border (IB) in Jammu and Kashmir's Samba district on Monday, officials said.

The operation was carried out based on information provided by overground workers (OGW) of Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) who were arrested on Friday after police gunned down three terrorists of the banned group in an encounter in Nagrota here, they said.

The OGWs, including handler Sameer Dar, were ferrying the terrorists in a truck.

Police and security forces, including Border Security Force (BSF) and Special Operation Group (SoG), launched the search operation this morning in the area along the IB in Basantar nallah in Samba, the officials told PTI.

They were accompanied by two sniffer dogs. They searched the entire riverine belt of Basantar and the bushy area along the IB to find if any other consignment of weapons or improvised explosive devices (IED) might have been dumped in the area, the officials added.

On Saturday, based on the disclosures made by the three OGWs, a police team and a bomb disposal squad had defused an IED fitted with RDX, grenades and other material and placed under a hoarding at Nagrota on the Jammu-Srinagar National Highway.

Monday's operation was also launched following a disclosure by the OGWs that the terrorists had infiltrated into Jammu and Kashmir via Basantar nallah along the IB in Samba.

According to reports, one of three OGWs was also taken to the spot to recreate the scene of infiltration.

Sources said the terrorists had spent a night in Chak Dalaya area and security agencies also questioned the people living near Basantar bridge.

The three JeM terrorists were killed on Friday morning at a toll plaza on the Jammu-Srinagar national highway. They were travelling towards the Kashmir Valley.

Sameer Dar is the cousin of Pulwama suicide bomber Adil Dar, who had rammed an explosive-laden SUV into a bus carrying CRPF personnel in Lethpora area of Pulwama district on the Srinagar-Jammu Highway, killing 40 troops, in February last year.