Militants attack Srinagar DD station

Militants attack Srinagar DD station
PRESS TRUST OF INDIA

SRINAGAR, MARCH 18: Militants on Saturday made an abortive bid to blow up the heavily-guarded Srinagar Doordarshan station by firing three rifle grenades. However, no one was injured in the attack, neither was any damage caused to the building.

The telecast of the programmes was also not disrupted, top DD officials said.

The grenades, fired from a projectile gun, exploded with a deafening sound of rattling doors and windows. One of the grenades hit a mighty chinar on the main gate while two others landed in a car parking area and near a studio close to the newsroom, the sources said.

Security personnel deployed at the DD station fired in retaliation but there were no casualties.

No militant outfit has claimed responsibility for the attack.

Doordarshan and the nearby Srinagar station of All India Radio have been the main targets of militants ever since militancy erupted in Kashmir in 1989-90.

The two Centres, sharing a common boundary wall, were attacked several times by militants in the past. A station engineer of Doordarshan was killed in one of these attacks.

Meanwhile, militants shot dead a police officer and a civilian and critically wounded three persons in Kashmir Valley since last evening.

Security forces nabbed three militants and smashed a militant hideout during the period, an official spokesman said.

He said militants gunned down assistant sub-inspector of police Mohammad Din at his house in Rajouri district's Shahdra Sharief area.

A militant barged into the house of Nazir Ahmed Ganai in Badgam district and fired indiscriminately at the inmates, killing one and wounding Nazir.

The spokesman said militants shot at and critically wounded a surrendered militant Nazir Ahmad at Dasu-Kokernag in Anantnag district Friday evening.

The spokesman said militants attacked members of a village defence committee at Kangla-Bala in Doda district on March 16. No one was injured.

Three militants were arrested in Srinagar while some arms and ammunition were recovered from a militant hideout at Chak-e-Traham in Baramulla district.