The chief of the country’s premiere Intelligence agency was present in Srinagar on July 7, a day before a joint operation was launched to search for three militants in which Hizbul Mujahideen terrorist Burhan Wani was also killed in Kokernag area of South Kashmir’s Anantnag district, highly-placed sources told The Pioneer.
During his visit, the senior-most officer had also attended a luncheon meeting with J&K Governor NN Vohra in Raj Bhawan on July 8 before flying back.
According to the sources, “Chief of Intelligence Bureau Dineshwar Sharma landed in Srinagar on July 7 and requested for a meeting with the Governor on July 8. Permission to attend the meeting was sought early in the morning by the office of Joint Director IB, Srinagar.”
The IB chief arrived in Raj Bhawan shortly after 12.00 pm and stayed there for a few hours. Joint Director, IB Harmeet Singh was seated in a separate room while the Governor attended the meeting with Dineshwar Sharma.
After the meeting Sharma went to Srinagar airport where he boarded the evening flight to New Delhi.
The presence of the IB chief in Kashmir Valley raises questions about the claims being made by Jammu & Kashmir Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti in public domain over the manner in which the entire operation was executed by the joint team of security forces.
Mehbooba Mufti had said that the security forces were not aware of the presence of Burhan Wani in the militant hideout and if they had known then he might have been given a ‘chance’.
PDP MP Muzaffar Hussain Baig had also claimed that Mehbooba Mufti was kept in the dark about Burhan Wani’s presence inside the hideout during the encounter.
A few days later Mehbooba’s deputy from the BJP claimed that Wani was killed ‘accidentally’ in a routine operation. However, Professor Nirmal Singh also issued a clarification denying that he said Wani was killed accidentally.
Incidentally, on July 1, Home Minister Rajnath Singh had chaired a high-level security review meeting in Srinagar and the same was attended by a galaxy of senior officers of the Central and State Intelligence agencies, paramilitary forces and officers of the Indian Army.
Rumours also surfaced, in the
aftermath of the killing of Burhan Wani that the entire operation to eliminate the terrorist was planned at the highest level and the IB chief was specially flown in to supervise the operational details to get the prize catch.
Kashmir Valley witnessed a cycle of violence after the terrorist’s death in which 52 lives have been lost and over 5,000 people including security forces have been injured till now.