Keralite sneaking into PoK killed, IM link likely

Central agencies had been monitoring certain leads which said a group of people hailing from Kerala along with Lashker-e-Taiba's support were trying to enter Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK) through North Kashmir.

The information was shared with the army headquarters in the national capital and a plan was chalked out to nab the exfiltrating group with the help of the state police.

A militant identified as Shakeel Mohammed hailing from Kovalam was killed in the encounter that took place between Nine Para and Special Operations Group in Dever area of Lolab Valley in North Kashmir.

A hunt is on to track down those who have escaped after the encounter, sources said.

Shakeel is the first Keralite to have been killed in nearly two decades of militancy in Jammu and Kashmir. A photo identity card was found from his pocket besides some religious writings written in Malayalam, the sources said.

The sources said the group is still scattered over the area and hunt was on to nab others with maximum efforts to nab them alive to ascertain the exact ramifications of Lashker's network in Kerala.

Another militant was killed in the same area but his identification showed that he was from Pakistan but was part of the same group that was exfiltrating into PoK along with a group of Keralites.

LeT has been trying to make inroads into the country's hinterland and had sought recruits from various parts of the country.

Police and army were maintaining a studied silence over this encounter officially but they acknowledged that this development was alarming.

The encounter comes close on the heels of intelligence reports suggesting that the banned SIMI had begun preparing itself for "participation" in the Indian Mujahideen offensive in December 2007 when nearly 40 of its members participated in a militant training camp held near Aluva, Kerala.

Earlier in February this year, Mohammed Yahya Kammukutty, 31, hailing from Mukkom in Kozhikode district of Kerala, was arrested as part of a continuing probe into a SIMI network in Karnataka that has already lead to the arrest of six youths from northern Karnataka, including four medical students.