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BJP sarpanch shot dead in J&K, police shift grassroots workers to safer places

SRINAGAR: A BJP sarpanch fell to terrorist bullets in south Kashmir’s Kulgam district early Thursday even as J&K Police started shifting dozens of panchayat functionaries to safe houses in anticipation of a wave of attacks targeting grassroots political workers by the banned Jaish-e-Mohammad and Lashkar-e-Taiba.



Sajad Ahmad Khanday, the head of Vessu village in Qazigund block of Kulgam, was called out from his house adjoining a 9 Rashtriya Rifles camp and fatally shot within 48 hours of another terrorist strike that left a fellow BJP sarpanch critically injured.

Like many panchayat functionaries in south Kashmir who have received death threats, Khanday had been provided official security , but he stepped out of home without his guards, officials said.

At least six BJP functionaries at the panchayat and block levels have quit the party in the past two days, citing their inability to continue in the face of persistent threats to their safety. Three office-bearers publicly resigned in Kulgam on the first anniversary of the nullification of J&K's special status, saying they could no longer spare time for the party. The trigger for the resignation was apparently the terrorist attack the previous evening in which BJP sarpanch Arif Ahmad was injured.

Three more grassroots workers of the saffron party — Shabir Ahmad Khan, Reyaz Rather and Abdul Khaliq Sheikh — quit on Thursday after allegedly seeking "forgiveness" from terror outfits. A picture circulated on social media shows the trio looking at the camera with folded hands.

The turmoil in the rural clusters of south Kashmir was accentuated by intelligence inputs about Pakistani terrorists of Jaish and Lashkar lying in wait to mount attacks on panchayat functionaries and other office-bearers, mainly from BJP.

A senior police official said political workers perceived to be under threat were being moved to "safer places" in Pahalgam and the Qazigund migrant cluster, where there is adequate deployment of security personnel. "The threat is more prominent in Anantnag and Kulgam districts. We are keeping some political workers in the Kulgam Pandit camp while some have been shifted to a CRPF camp in Pahalgam for their safety."

The sequence of attacks on panchayat office-bearers started almost two months ago when terrorists killed Congress sarpanch Ajay Pandita in his house on June 8. A month later, senior BJP functionary Sheikh Waseem Bari, his father and brother were shot dead in Bandipora district.






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