Nowgam Blast Rekindles Focus On Area's Long History Of Terror Activity

Visual from the site. (Photo: IANS)

Once a major transit route for terrorists moving between their South Kashmir strongholds and Srinagar, Nowgam has been in the news since mid-October following the busting of an international “white-collar’’ terror module.

The most recent development is the accidental explosion at the Nowgam Police Station and its link to the uncovered terror network.

The key incident occurred on November 14, when a massive blast at the Nowgam Police Station killed nine people and injured 27 others, including police and forensic personnel.

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The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and the Jammu and Kashmir Police have classified the blast as accidental. It took place while a joint team was processing and extracting samples from a large cache of 2,900 kg of explosive chemicals and materials, including ammonium nitrate, seized from a terror module a few days earlier in Faridabad.

While both the Police and MHA have confirmed it was an accidental explosion, questions remain about the exact trigger, prompting Lieutenant Governor Manoj Sinha to order a time-bound probe.

The intensity of the blast was so severe that it shook a 5 km radius around Nowgam, badly damaging the police station and nearby buildings. Of the 2,900 kg of explosives seized from Faridabad and brought to the station, a portion detonated while the rest scattered across the area. Due to the spill, security forces launched sanitisation operations, which are still underway.

Nowgam has remained tense since mid-October after an investigation began into threatening posters that had surfaced in the area. The probe led to the discovery of a “white-collar’’ terror module involving radicalised doctors, a Shopian-based imam, Molvi Irfan, and several professionals linked to Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) and Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind.

For more than three decades of militancy in Kashmir, Nowgam has been a strategically important link between South Kashmir, the hub of terror activity, and Srinagar city. Security analysts often describe it as a critical transit corridor and an operational base for terror networks.

Positioned in South Srinagar, Nowgam connects to volatile districts like Pulwama and Shopian, long associated with high levels of recruitment and terror movement. This connectivity has historically enabled the movement of militants, weapons, and logistics. Its semi-urban layout allows terrorists to blend in, plan operations, and access Srinagar using routes from the south.

Security records show Nowgam has often served as a movement point for militants travelling between South Kashmir strongholds and Srinagar. Multiple terror modules have operated from and been dismantled in the area.

Major counter-terror operations here include the killing of Pakistani national and LeT commander Naveed Jatt, who had escaped police custody months earlier and was involved in the murder of senior journalist Shujaat Bukhari.

In October 2018, two more terrorists were killed in an encounter in Nowgam.

A major terror attack in the broader Nowgam area occurred in 2005 when a Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorist detonated a car bomb near the former residence of then Chief Minister Mufti Mohammad Sayeed. At least 10 people, including a 10-year-old boy, a woman pedestrian, and three police personnel, were killed, while 18 others were injured. It was one of the most high-profile attacks targeting political and security establishments in the area.

Divided by the National Highway, Nowgam has long posed risks to security convoys using the route, as its narrow lanes and by-lanes offer militants easy escape options. Over the past three decades, multiple convoy attacks have taken place on the bypass connecting to Nowgam. On two occasions, explosive-laden vehicles were intercepted and destroyed on the Lasjan–Chanapora bypass.