CRPF Inspector Killed During Encounter With Terrorists In J&K's Udhampur

Officials said that an inspector of the CRPF belonging to the 187th battalion was hit by a bullet and later succumbed to injuries while being taken to hospital.

A CRPF inspector was killed in a terrorist attack during a joint patrol with the J&K Police.

Source : PTI

A Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) inspector was killed after terrorists attacked a joint party of the force and Special Operations Group (SOG) of the Jammu and Kashmir Police in Udhampur district, officials said on Monday.

As per reports, the CRPF and the J&K police were conducting a routine patrol when an encounter took place in the Ramnagar area of the Udhampur district.

The CRPF along with the SOG of the local police was fired upon by terrorists around 3:30 pm in the remote Dudu area of Basantgarh, the officials said.

Inspector Kuldeep Kumar, 54, of the CRPF belonging to the 187th Battalion was hit by a bullet and later succumbed to injuries while being taken to hospital, officials said. Kumar hailed from Haryana.

#WATCH | J&K: A joint patrol party of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) and Jammu and Kashmir Police came under heavy fire from terrorists in the Cheel, Dudu area of Udhampur District today. CRPF Inspector Kuldeep Singh lost his life in the operation.

Security… pic.twitter.com/Zcol1Eui80

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A police spokesman said that the exchange of fire took place between terrorists and joint parties of police and CRPF during the area domination patrol at Chill village of Dudu. "In the encounter, one inspector of CRPF suffered bullet injuries and attained martyrdom. (The anti-terrorist) operation continues," he said.

Kumar's mortal remains were being brought to district headquarters for postmortem.   

The terrorists fled the scene amid strong retaliation by the joint patrolling party. Meanwhile, security forces have been rushed to the scene and a search operation has been launched to track down and neutralise the militants.

The forest area of Basantgarh has witnessed a couple of terror incidents since April - when a village defence guard was killed in a gunfight with terrorists.

The latest incident comes five days after a gunfight in Doda district left an army captain and a heavily armed terrorist dead. The killing took the number of terror-related fatalities in Jammu and Kashmir this year to 74.

The dead included 21 security personnel and 35 terrorists. Of these, Jammu region's six districts -- Doda, Kathua, Reasi, Poonch and Rajouri districts -- accounted for 30 deaths including 14 security personnel and six terrorists.