Panic in Achabal: Gunmen Shoot Dead Senior Leader of Geelani's Hurriyat

SRINAGAR: A senior leader of Syed Ali Geelani’s Tehreek-e-Hurriyat was assassinated at his home in a south Kashmir village today morning, days after he claimed threat to life. His wife was injured in the shooting but she is reportedly stable.

Officials said unknown gunmen barged into a residence in Badru-Akingam area of Achabal in south Kashmir today morning and fired indiscriminately at a man and his wife, leaving them severely injured.

As neighbours rushed to the double-storied house to check what was going on, they found Hafizullah Mir, the district president of Anantnag for Tehreek-e-Hurriyat, and his wife, laying in a pool of blood.

Witnesses said the shooting caused panic in the area and neighbours searched for the gunmen who had managed to escape from the area. One local said there were two gunmen on a bike but this was not corroborated by police.

Mir and his wife were in the meantime rushed to Anantnag district hospital where he was declared dead on arrival while his wife is reported to be stable. Police is waiting for her recovery to know more about the gunmen.

“He had suffered bullet injuries in chest and abdomen and had died by the time he was brought here,” medical superintendent of Anantnag district hospital, Dr Abdul Majeed Mehrab said.

According to reports, Mir had served two-year detention in different jails of the state and he was released last month. The details of his family were not immediately known.

In a statement last week, the Tehreek-e-Hurriyat had alleged Mir was getting death threats over phone.

"Since last one month some unknown people are suspiciously roaming around his house and at times knocking the doors and windows and inquiring about Mir Hafizullah that makes the whole family frightened," a spokesman of TeH had said in the statement.

Police declined to comment on the assassination which comes on a day when four militants and an army soldier were killed while two more soldiers suffered injuries in an encounter in Anantnag’s adjoining Shopian district.

All the four militants were locals affiliated with the Hizbul Mujahideen outfit. The slain Army soldier was with the elite Para unit. The other two injured soldiers are from the Army’s Rashtriya Rifles.

Two youth, including a class 11 student, were killed by suspected militants in Shopian district last week with the Hizb’s Kashmir chief Riyaz Naikoo who police believes ordered the killings, accusing one of the slain youth for working as informer of security agencies.