By labelling Kashmir Pandits as settlers and threatening them with dire consequences by publishing names of 56 Pandits, culled out of a government transfer order of May-June 2021, the Pakistan-based terror groups are showing signs of desperation in wake of dominant action by security forces and intelligence agencies.
At a meeting chaired by Union home secretary Ajay Bhalla to review ongoing projects in Jammu and Kashmir on Tuesday, there was broad consensus among the national security planners that publishing of old Kashmiri Pandit list, many of whom have been transferred in the interregnum, is part of psychological warfare by Pakistani deep state which uses both Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed against India for their so-called political objectives in the Valley.
Top Jammu and Kashmir security officials told news agency that LeT’s jihadi front, The Resistance Front, which published the list, is desperate to show results to their handlers across the border but their cadres have been decimated by action of the security forces.
“As many as 80 TRF terrorists have been neutralized out of around 110. The shelf life of these TRF extremists is 10 to 15 days after their overground action,” said a top J &K official.
With more than 52 foreign terrorists being gunned down by the J&K police and security forces this year, once dominant extremist groups now stand decimated in the Valley and Jammu and now tend to operate more as a modules of two to four extremists. “The activity of LeT and JeM have been severely degraded with the majority of over ground workers being neutralized. The Hizbul Mujahideen has been more or less neutralized and hence the focus is on threat and targeting innocents, said a senior official.
In wake of publishing of the list of Kashmiri Pandits and threatening of journalists by the Pakistani terror groups through their supplicants in the Valley, the security forces have decided to meet the challenge head on by increasing area domination of the vulnerable localities with focus on safety of minorities.
Cyber action is also being considered to block jihadi traffic from across the borders to those already radicalized in the Valley. The Pakistani deep state uses propaganda to instigate the majority Sunni Muslim community in the Valley against India and spread the narrative that Centre is out to change the demography of the union territory. That the Kashmiri Pandit community was hounded out of the Valley by Pakistani terror groups and their supporters within in the past three decades is conveniently swept under the carpet.