CRPF’s CCTV, BSNL’s towers tracked BSF cavalcade

Zahid Farooq was gunned down by cop in presence of his Commandant on Boulevard

AHMED ALI FAYYAZ

SRINAGAR, Feb 10: It was probably for the first time in 20-year-long armed insurgency in Jammu & Kashmir that armed forces bucked under Chief Minister’s pressure, exerted through the proper channel of the Union Home Minister, and lost no time in suspending and handing over to Jammu & Kashmir Police an official who was found guilty of gunning down a teenager in broad daylight. Notwithstanding varying statements of senior BSF officials, it has been established with the use of technology that the erring Constable had opened fire on 16-year-old Zahid Farooq in the afternoon of February 5th in Nishat area in presence of the Commanding Officer of BSF 68 Bn, R K Virdhi.

Highly placed authoritative sources revealed to Early Times that immediately after Chief Minister Omar Abdullah’s conversation with the Union Home Minister P Chidambaram on the sidelines of Chief Ministers Conference on Internal Security in New Delhi and the latter’s subsequent directions to senior Home Ministry and BSF officials, J&K Police received remarkable support from the central armed forces. On CM’s instructions, Police had already constituted a Special Investigation Team (SIT), comprising SP East B S Virdhi, SP South Mohammad Irshad, SDPO Nehru Park Muzaffar Ahmed and other officials which worked under constant supervision of SSP Srinagar, Javed Riyaz Bedar. Senior officials, including DIG Central Kashmir, Hemant Kumar Lohia, IGP Kashmir, Farooq Ahmed, and DGP, Kuldeep Khoda, remained in touch with senior BSF officials until the investigation was completed and the man responsible for killing Zahid was identified.

On the directions from New Delhi, BSF’s Special DG flew from Chandigarh to Srinagar on Tuesday and Constable Lakhwinder was placed under suspension and handed over to Police under his personal supervision. Not a single event of this nature could be traced in records of 20-year-long militancy when, on most of identical situations, Central authorities argued that public arrest of a soldier would only ‘demoralise’ the security forces.

Handling a challenging investigation---and to an extent rebuilding the state Police’s image which suffered a setback in SIT’s failure in Shopian last year--- Srinagar SSP’s team left no stone unturned in getting the killer identified and arrested.

Sources revealed that after a detailed questioning of one Bilal Ahmed and his associates, who claimed to be the eyewitnesses of the shootout, SIT began the scan the movement of all vehicles of Police, BSF, CRPF and other armed forces on Srinagar-Nishat Road (Boulevard) on the day of occurrence with the help of modern technology. Since after CRPF’s near-total takeover in the capital city few years back, there has been one-odd BSF formation (Headquarters of 68 Bn at Gupt Ganga Ishbar) in Srinagar, SIT zeroed in on the movement of its officers and units.

Tracking the Commanding Officer (BSF 68 Bn) R K Virdhi’s movement with the call detailed record of his BSNL Mobile phone No: 9419024362, SIT noticed that he had moved from his Ishbar (Nishat) headquarters towards Srinagar city between 0730 and 0745 hours on February 5th. BSNL Raj Bhawan tower handled his call at 0741 hours. Thereafter, he was found stationed in Humhama area from 0821 hours to 1225 hours and In Friends Enclave area from 1226 hours to 1430 hours. Nearly 20 minutes after the shootout, Virdhi reached back to his battalion headquarters at Ishbar.

Even as BSF officials initially refuted the force’s involvement and denied to have made any movement on Boulevard around the timing of shootout, they later admitted that the Commandant had visited BSF’s hospital at Humhama in connection with a routine and scheduled medical check up. Tracking further, SIT found that CRPF’s Closed Circuit TV at the nearby office of IG CRPF Kashmir at Kralsangri Crossing had recorded the movement of Virdhi’s cavalcade of three vehicles, first towards Srinagar in the morning and later back towards his office in the afternoon.

During questioning, Virdhi revealed that he had moved to Humhama for his medical check up. On his way back, he observed some catcalling and ‘disturbance’ from a group of youngsters on Boulevard, in close vicinity of the office of IG CRPF. When the cavalcade screeched to a halt, some of his escort personnel got down and began chasing away the youngsters. It was on this occasion that Constable Lakhwinder opened fire that hit a youngster and later he succumbed to injuries. Immediately after the shootout, BSF cavalcade drove to the formation headquarters at Ishbar. Constable Lakhwinder was subsequently handed over to SIT.

Sources said that during his sustained interrogation, Lakhwinder corroborated the statement of Bilal Ahmed and other of his associates and said that he got exasperated due to the “provocative catcalling” by the students and opened fire from his Insas rifle. He revealed that he was wearing a white civilian jacket which was recovered from him alongwith other things by the SIT.

Lakhwinder has been placed under suspension and handed over formally to Police Station Nishat where an FIR of murder stood registered against the unidentified “security forces personnel”. Sources said that Police prosecutors were now on the job of making a “foolproof” case of murder against him. According to them, investigation would be completed in a couple of days and challan would be produced subsequently in a civil court in Srinagar.

END