Three militants believed to be trapped in encounter in north Kashmir

Three militants, including scholar-turned-terrorist Manan Wani, are believed to have been trapped in an encounter at Handwara in frontier district of north Kashmir, officials said Thursday.

Giving details emerging from the encounter site, which is taking place at Satgund in Handwara, police and other security forces cordoned off a village following intelligence inputs about presence of Wani along with two others, they said.

Police was making repeated announcements on public address system appealing to the militants to surrender, they said.

There was a lull in firing at around 9 AM, prompting the police to initiate search operation at the encounter site, but the same had to be suspended after firing resumed after 15 minutes, the officials said.

Wani, who was enrolled as a PhD scholar with the Aligarh Muslim University (AMU), joined militant ranks in January this year.