A day after three terrorists were gunned down in Jammu-Kashmir’s Chattabal, a fresh encounter broke out between terrorists and security forces in Shopian.

Police said that the encounter started in the morning after security forces launched a search operation in Badigam village following specific information of presence of terrorists.

The village is located in Zainapora area of the south Kashmir district. While the security forces were cordoning off the area, the terrorists, believed to be 2-3, fired at them.

Security forces then retaliated. The gunfight was on at the time of writing.

On Saturday, three terrorists from Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and a civilian were killed during an encounter in Chattabal in Srinagar.

Three CRPF personnel were also injured during the encounter which started early in the morning and was over by the noon.

Security forces recovered three AK-47 assault rifles and ammunition from the encounter spot. One of the terrorists has been identified as  Fayaz Ah Hamal, a local from Srinagar.

Chattabal encounter update :

One of the three terrorists killed has been identified as Fayaz Ah Hamal a local terrorist from Srinagar.@JmuKmrPolice

— Kashmir Zone Police (@KashmirPolice) May 5, 2018

Among the injured CRPF personnel is an assistant sub-inspector, said Ravideep Sahi, Inspector General of CRPF.

A large number of stone-pelters gathered at the encounter spot but were chased away by the police.

The incident, however, took a controversial turn due to the death of the civilian.

Identified as Adil Ahmad, the man was hit when the driver of a vehicle of the security forces tried to speed away to save the occupants from being attacked by stone-pelters. He was brought dead to the SMHS hospital in Srinagar.

Though the police initially denied the claim by the locals that Ahmad had died after he was mowed down by the vehicle, it later said that necessary legal action has been initiated in the case. A video of the incident had gone viral by that time.

Read More: Police initiates action against driver of vehicle that mowed down civilian in J-K

Separatist leader Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, too, had shared the video and accused the CRPF of “murder”.

“How a murder was committed by the forces today and then brazenly denied ! Is there no sense of humanity left in India?” he wrote on Twitter on 5 May.

Terrorists killing civilians

At least six innocent persons were shot dead this week by Pakistan-backed terrorists who are trying to create scare and block flow of information of their presence to the security forces.

North Kashmir has become the hotspot of civilian killings where three persons were shot dead in two separate incidents in the wee hours on Saturday, while three young boys were killed earlier this week in Baramulla.

Two persons were shot dead in the wee hours on Saturday by Lashkar-e-Toiba (LeT) terrorists who abducted them from their house in the Shahgund area of Hajin in Bandipura district.

Terrorists also shot dead a civilian Mohammad Ashraf Mir and critically injured his wife in the Sopore town in North Kashmir.

Hajin has become a haven for Pakistani terrorists and efforts of the security forces to eliminate them have not yielded the desired results. Terrorists brutally killed two young boys of the village whom they suspected of being informers of security forces.

Reports indicate that some Pakistani terrorists with support of their local accomplices were behind these killings. The motive behind such killings was to create fear among the civilians as the terrorists suspect that information about their movement in the villages of North and South Kashmir was being provided by some local people to the security forces, said an intelligence source.