Srinagar: Top Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) militant Abu Dujana, who was gunned down on Tuesday by the security forces in an encounter in the Pulwama district of Jammu and Kashmir, was infamous among locals for his debauchery.


COMMERCIAL BREAK
SCROLL TO CONTINUE READING

Dujana's regular visits to young women's homes in Kashmir when it was dark had almost landed him in Indian security forces' net many times. DNA has quoted sources as saying that the Pakistani national managed to give a slip to the security forces, who had laid traps near the houses of his paramours, on at least five occasions.


Dujana, wanted in connection with several terror attacks, was killed by security forces on Tuesday when he went to visit his Indian wife in a village in Jammu and Kashmir's Pulwama district.


The Jammu and Kashmir Police, which had apparently been tracking the militant, called the killing of Abu Dujana, whom they described as the Lashkar-e-Toiba commander active in southern Kashmir since 2012, as a "huge achievement".


Dujana, a resident of Gilgit-Baltistan region in the Pakistan-occupied Kashmir, was said to be responsible for a number of attacks on Indian security forces, including the August 2015 Udhampur strike that left two Border Security Force troopers dead and 12 injured.


Addressing the media with Lt Gen JS Sandhu, General Officer Commanding of the Army's 15th Corps, Inspector General of Police Munir Khan said: "Dujana's killing is good riddance to a nuisance."


Acting on information about the presence of Dujana and Lalihaari, security forces surrounded the village at about 3 am on Tuesday and the house.


The inmates in the house, which included Dujana's wife and her parents, were told to leave. The family was then asked to persuade the Pakistani to surrender. He refused, triggering the gun battle.


"The operation ended after bodies of the two militants were recovered from the site and identified," the police officer said.


Who is Abu Dujana and what his death means for Indian security forces?


Both Khan and Lt Gen Sandhu said Dujana was now mostly indulging in "ayyashi" (debauchery) more than anything else.


Two houses in the village were destroyed in the gunfight.


How security forces cornered LeT commander Abu Dujana in Pulwama


The police said Dujana had broken loose from the LeT in last few months after which he established close proximity with Zakir Musa, who was recently appointed the head of al Qaeda terror outfit in the Kashmir Valley.


Dujana was replaced by Abu Muhammad Ismail as the Divisional Commander of the LeT, a Pakistan-based group that masterminded the 2008 Mumbai terror attack that killed 166 Indians and foreigners.


Ismail had carried out the July 10 attack on an Amarnath Yatra bus in Anantnag district which killed eight pilgrims.


(With Agency inputs)