Pakistani terrorist escapes after shots fired at Srinagar hospital, cop killed

The Pakistani prisoner who escaped during the attack on Srinagar’s Shri Maharaja Hari Singh hospital was Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist Naveed Jat, also known as Abu Hanzulla.

india Updated: Feb 06, 2018 14:05 IST
One policeman died after militants fired shots at Shri Maharaja Hari Singh hospital in Srinagar.
One policeman died after militants fired shots at Shri Maharaja Hari Singh hospital in Srinagar.(ANI Photo)

A policeman was killed and one injured on Tuesday after militants attacked a government-run hospital in Srinagar that allowed a hardened Pakistani terrorist to escape, police said.

The shots were fired in the casualty area of the Shri Maharaja Hari Singh Hospital where Naveed Jat and five other prisoners were brought for a checkup, police said.

“It was a planned militant attack as armed gunmen shot at policemen accompanying a Pakistani militant identified as Naveed Jat,” Srinagar deputy inspector general Ghulam Hassan Bhat said.

A resident of Multan in Pakistan’s Punjab province, Jat, also known as Abu Hanzulla, was a Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorist allegedly involved in killing of many policemen and a teacher, sources said.

He was arrested from South Kashmir, the hotbed of militancy, in 2014 and was lodged in Srinagar’s Rainawari jail.

Two policemen were shot at and one of them —head constable Mushtaq Ahmad — later succumbed to his injuries, Bhat said. Some other people also received bullet wounds, sources said.

The other five prisoners remain in police custody.

The area has been cordoned off and search launched for Jat, police said.

Earlier, Srinagar SSP Imtiaz Ismail Parray had said one of the prisoners “snatched weapons from police and fired at the protection party”.