Drones were hovering over Srinagar Central Jail on Monday, as twenty teams of the National Investigation Agency assisted by the counter terror NSG and state police swooped down upon the central jail to carry out an unprecedented search inside the complex. This operation was carried out by the central agency in connection with its case related to the arrest of Danish Gulam Lone and Sohail Ahmed Bhat by Kupwara Police, in which it was found that fresh recruits of Al-Badr, a proscribed terrorist organization, were being sent across for arms training as part of a conspiracy hatched from inside the Central Jail in Srinagar.
The terrorists lodged in jails in the insurgency hit state have become the latest cause of worry for the central security agencies after arrested Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist Naveed Jutt alias Abu Hanzala escaped police custody while being taken to a city hospital in Srinagar for a check up on February 6.
The inteligence agencies have warned that these terrorists continue to remain a security threat inside jails in Kashmir. The concern of the central agencies was that the jails could be used as breeding grounds for terrorist activities and had flagged the issue to the Union home ministry which adviced that they should be shifted to jails outside the valley.
Last month, the Union home ministry issued a stern advisory to the state government asking it to shift dreaded Pakistani terrorists lodged in various jails in Kashmir to other states.
The entire search operation on Monday was being monitored by the central investigation agency through the images captured by the drones. The teams were also accompanied by magistrates, witnesses and doctors.
“The searches started early morning and continued till late afternoon. All the barracks and the open ground were thoroughly searched with the help of well-trained teams and deep search metal detectors. A close watch on the entire operation was kept with the help of drones,” said the NIA spokesperson.
The NIA has seized 25 mobile phones, some SIM cards, five SD cards and five pen drives, one iPod and large number of incriminating documents including a poster of Hizbul Mujahideen and a Pakistani flag besides jihadi literature.
In its communication to the Jammu and Kashmir government last month, the MHA had also asked the state government and jail authorities to conduct a security audit of all jails. The MHA handed over the probe to the NIA asking it to investigate a possible conspiracy angle to Naveed’s escape. The MHA also termed it a terror incident as two police officials were killed when militants who where helping Naveed had fired upon them outside the SMHS hospital in Srinagar. As many as 25 terrorists lodged in various jails in the Valley have already been shifted to jails outside the valley.