Army chief General Dalbir Singh Suhag will visit the restive Kashmir Valley for a day on Friday to take stock of the situation against the backdrop of continuing turmoil for the last two months and rising infiltration from across the line of Control(loC). He had met Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh here on Wednesday to brief him about measures taken to check infiltration and levels of militancy related violence.
Top commanders of the Northern Command will apprise Suhag about the prevailing security scenario within towns of South Kashmir after violent protests broke out following the killing of militant leader Burhan Wani in July.
Suhag's visit also comes in the backdrop of reports that the Army may be deployed in some of the worst affected towns to restore normalcy. The Army in conjunction with the CRPF and BSF is likely to carry out area domination exercises in the outskirts of these towns to re establish the writ of the Government and give a sense of security to law abiding local citizens.
Moreover, the Army and central para military forces are likely to help the local administration in restoring lines of communication as local police in some places wad forced to leave their posts by protestors. It left a vacuum in day to day functioning thereby crippling the state machinery as Government buildings were also torched by mobs.
On the issue of surge in infiltration from across the lOC, Suhag will review the steps taken to check this phenomenon besides measures put in place to deny militants a free run in the hinterland. While the three-tier anti-infiltration grid was strengthened by deploying additional troops, operational commanders were also directed to conduct anti-militancy operations based on real time intelligence, sources said here on Thursday.
As many as 75 successful infiltration attempts have taken place till last month as compared to 30 such bids recorded in the entire last year. Moreover, infiltration was likely to go up in the coming weeks as Pakistan was determined to push in more terrorists to sustain militancy and increase the levels of violence, officials said.