New Delhi: Three terrorists of the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba and its offshoot the Resistance Front (TRF), were killed in an encounter with security forces in the Dachigam forest near Srinagar in Kashmir on Monday.
While several reports suggested them to be the actual gunmen behind the Pahalgam terror attack that killed 25 tourists and one local, sources in the security establishment told ThePrint that at least one of the terrorists killed is most likely to be behind the attack in April this year.
The operation, codenamed Mahadev, was launched by a joint team of the Indian Army’s Chinar Corps, the Jammu and Kashmir Police, and the Central Reserve Police Force in the forest near Dachigam National Park.
However, there were no official statements from any of the security forces conducting the operation.
Kashmir Zone Inspector General of Police, Vidhi Kumar Birdi, stated that identifying the terrorists would take time and that the security forces were still in the area. “The operation is continuing. According to the interior reports, three bodies have been observed and appear to have been neutralised. It will take us some time for identification, and the parties are still inside,” IG Virdi told reporters.
However, he refused to divulge specific details about the operation.
The TRF had initially taken responsibility for the Pahalgam attack but later withdrew in the wake of widespread condemnation and global outrage.
The probe into the terrorist attack was later handed over to the National Investigation Agency, which had sent its senior officers from the very beginning of the investigation.
The agency has so far arrested two Kashmiri men who allegedly provided at least three Pakistani terrorists involved in the Pahalgam terror attack with food, shelter and logistical support in the days leading up to the massacre.
“Parvaiz and Bashir had knowingly harboured the three armed terrorists at a seasonal dhok (hut) at Hill Park before the attack, as per NIA investigations. The two men had provided food, shelter and logistical support to the terrorists, who had, on the fateful afternoon, selectively killed the tourists on the basis of their religious identity, making it one of the most gruesome terrorist attacks ever,” the NIA spokesperson said last month.
Later, the agency also registered a case to investigate the funding of the TRF. The terror outfit, which has been behind several terrorist attacks targeting civilians in Kashmir, was earlier designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organisation and Specially Designated Global Terrorist.
“TRF, a Lashkar-e-Tayyiba (LeT) front and proxy, claimed responsibility for the 22 April 2025 Pahalgam attack, which killed 26 civilians. This was the deadliest attack on civilians in India since the 2008 Mumbai attacks conducted by LeT,” the US State Department said in a statement Friday, announcing the designation of the group as a terrorist organisation.
The Pahalgam attack triggered an armed conflict between India and Pakistan as India launched Operation Sindoor targeting terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan.
The latest encounter coincides with the debate on the attack and subsequent Operation Sindoor in Parliament.
Initiating the debate on the subject in the lower house of Parliament, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh Monday said the Indian Armed Forces had destroyed seven terrorist infrastructures in Pakistan. Additionally, he warned Pakistan that Operation Sindoor would resume if it did not halt its misadventure.
Meanwhile, BJP MP Baijayant Panda also suggested that at least one of the terrorists killed in Srinagar today was behind Pahalgam attack.
“As we were debating this issue today, some of us must have seen in the news that an Operation Mahadev is being conducted in Jammu and Kashmir targeted at terrorists, and it appears that at least one of those eliminated today was involved in the Pahalgam attack,” BJP MP Panda said in Lok Sabha.
(Edited by Viny Mishra)
Also read: Why was war not goal? If we don’t reclaim PoK now, then when—Gogoi asks Centre in Op Sindoor debate