NIA, J&K police to jointly probe all terror cases in Jammu, says Amit Shah

Jammu: Union Home Minister Amit Shah, on his one-day visit to the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir on Friday, disclosed that in the wake of the Rajouri carnage on  January 1, 2023, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) would investigate all the recent terror incidents in Jammu in close coordination with the Jammu and Kashmir Police.

“The Government of India has assigned the investigation of all recent terror incidents in Jammu jointly to the NIA and the Jammu and Kashmir Police. The Jammu Police will remain fully involved with the investigation”, Shah said at a news conference after chairing a high level security review meeting at the Raj Bhavan in Jammu. He reached Jammu by a special plane but due to bad weather his helicopter failed to take off for Rajouri where the Home Minister was scheduled to meet the families of the seven civilians, including two children, who died in twin terror attacks at Dhangri village on 1st and 2nd January.

Shah said that the NIA along with the J&K Police would investigate all the terror-related incidents of the Jammu province in the last one and a half years. He said that the security and intelligence agencies would effectively deal with the terrorists’ support structure, including the over-ground workers, and information mechanism with all necessary actions. “In today’s meeting, we took a 360 degree review of the entire security gambit and it was decided by all the agencies that the counterterror grid would be strengthened further and this task would be completed in the next three months”, Shah said, while speaking about an action plan for Jammu.

Shah said that everybody involved in the Jammu terror strikes would be identified and the security agencies would bring them to justice in a court of law. He said that a time-bound action plan of 3 months deadline had been put in place and the whole counterterror grid would be strengthened accordingly. “The terrorists will make every attempt to destabilise the system but our agencies’ endeavour would be to provide all possible security and protection to the potential targets of terrorism”, Shah asserted.

Shah said that the decision of strengthening the J&K counterinsurgency grid had been taken at the end of August 2022 and the recent terror attacks in Jammu had only underscored the urgency of this task. He asserted that the Government of India was standing with the victims of all these terror attacks and they would be provided every protection.

“Those who planned and executed the terror attacks in Rajouri would be soon brought to justice”, Shah said and disclosed that all necessary powers had been given to the Lieutenant Governor.

The Home Minister asserted that the one-odd incident of attack on the minority in Rajouri could not define the security scenario in totality—claiming that the security agencies were firmly behind the members of the minority communities in Rajouri, Poonch, entire Jammu, South Kashmir and other places. The LG, he said, had all necessary powers and he was duly taking care of the minorities. He said that due to bad weather, he could not reach out to the families of the terror victims on Friday but added that he would return and visit them in the near future.

“Today, I spoke to each family member of the terror victims over the phone and assured them all support. I am relieved that despite losing dear ones, they are ready to fight terror with full vigour”, Shah said.

Shah asserted that the security situation had shown remarkable improvement in the last over three years and the incidents of terror-related violence had fallen to the lowest level after abrogation of Article 370. On the other hand, the maximum number of the terrorists had been eliminated, he said.

Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha, Senior security and intelligence officials from New Delhi, General Officer Commanding-in-Chief Northern Command Lt General Upendra Dwivedi and Director General of the Jammu and Kashmir Police, Dilbag Singh, participated in the Home Minister’s high level security review meeting at the Raj Bhavan.