Amid fresh intelligence reports that militant groups are planning to disrupt the annual Amarnath Yatra, starting from June 29, the Army is fully geared up for the success of Operation Shiva.
On Monday, the senior most Army officer of the Northern Command lt Gen KT Parnaik confirmed that intelligence agencies have received certain warnings that the militant groups were planning to strike the yatra but he said it is very difficult to predict the identity and the timing of those planning to strike the yatra.
He said the issue of foolproof security apparatus for the Amarnath Yatra has been discussed during the meeting of the Unified command and other security review meetings.
He said, “We have to maintain extra vigil during the yatra to thwart these attempts at any cost.”
He said, “Even the Army is discharging its duty of maintaining the over all surveillance but the real job of ensuring route security lies with the central paramilitary forces and the State police and they have to be very cautious in the coming days as we have been receiving intelligence inputs that militants may strike during the yatra period.”
Responding to the nature of threat to the pilgrims undertaking the yatra, the Army officer said, even if the attackers know that tight and elaborate security arrangements have been put in place even then it is difficult to prevent a militant strike amid huge rush of pilgrims.
He said our job is to prevent any militant strike and we have taken adequate security measures and improved our intelligence gathering to counter their nefarious designs.