Jammu and Kashmir: Lieutenant governor Girish Chandra Murmu on hit list of terrorists

The lieutenant governor of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), Girish Chandra Murmu, is potentially on the hit list of terror groups operating in the valley, intel sources revealed on Thursday. According to sources, a secret meeting of blacklisted terror groups was recently conducted in Muzaffarabad in Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir (PoK) where Lt Gov GC Murmu's name was mentioned to be on the hit list. Not just that, even the candidate who won the recently conducted Block Development Council (BDC) elections in the erstwhile state is also on the same hit list, sources added.

Girish Chandra Murmu took oath as the lieutenant governor of the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir last Thursday, i.e. October 31. He is a 1985 batch IAS officer of Gujarat cadre and was the principal secretary to Narendra Modi during his tenure as Chief Minister of Gujarat. He is said to be a trusted aide of PM Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah.

According to updates, a meeting was called by the Pakistan-based terrorist outfit Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) on October 29 at the Jama-ul-Haq Madrasa in PoK's Kotli. Jia-ul-Rahman Mir of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) is the primary schemer behind the conspiracy, intel said, adding that the conspiracy also involves the LeT and Hizbul Mujahideen targeting significant political leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in J&K.

In the meeting that was conducted, chiefs of all the terrorist outfits, including LeT, JeM, Hizbul and other subsidiary groups were present. The commanders have already instructed the terrorists to carry out more Fidayeen attacks on a regular and efficient basis. JeM had also convened a meeting of the Fidayeen attackers at Bahawalpur in Pakistan, where it was said, according to sources, that Pakistan's premier intelligence agency Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) has approved of the attacks.

The Union Territories of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh came into existence after the bifurcation of the official bifurcation of the erstwhile state on October 31, a move that has been marked with extremist tensions in the valley ever since the decision to abrogate Article 370 of the Indian Constitution was announced by the BJP government two months ago on August 5. Repeated terrorist attacks have taken place in the valley that took the life of several civilians, the most recent one being a terrorist attack in J&K's Kulgam earlier this week that took the life of five labourers from West Bengal.

India now officially has one state-less and two Union Territories more - J&K and Ladakh, i.e. India now has 28 states and nine union territories.