New Delhi: Union home minister Amit Shah informed the Lok Sabha on Tuesday that the three terrorists killed in an encounter with security forces near Srinagar on Monday were the Pakistani ones involved in the Pahalgam massacre. Their identities were confirmed by their facilitators who are now in the custody of the National Investigation Agency (NIA), Shah said.
The bodies of the slain terrorists were moved to Srinagar where they were identified by the facilitators. Shah also said that the ammunition found with the terrorists after Monday’s encounter matched those used in Pahalgam on April 22.
“All three terrorists – Suleman, Afghan and Jibran were killed in yesterday’s operation. The people who used to supply food to them were detained earlier. Once the bodies of these terrorists were brought to Srinagar, they were identified by those who were kept detained by our agencies,” Shah told the House.
All three terrorists were Pakistani nationals, and we even have their voter ID numbers, Shah revealed. Additionally, the chocolates recovered from them were also manufactured in Pakistan, he said, hitting out at Congress leader P Chidambaram who had questioned how the Government could be so sure that the terrorists involved were from Pakistan.
The home minister also shot back at slogan-shouting Opposition members by saying: “I thought they would be happy to learn that the terrorists involved in the Pahalgam attack have been eliminated. But it seems that they are sad.”
“Suleman alias Faizal…, Afghan and Jibran, were the three terrorists killed in Operation Mahadev that was a joint operation by the Indian Army, CRPF and Jammu and Kashmir Police… Suleman was an A-category commander of the Lashkar-e-Taiba. Afghan was an A-category Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist. So was Jibran… All three terrorists who killed our citizens in the Baisaran valley have been eliminated…” Shah told reporters in Delhi.