Key Points

Officials said the security forces surrounded Ajas village in Bandipora district following information about the presence of terrorists there.

"As the security forces came closer to hiding terrorists, they fired, triggering an encounter which is now going on. During the encounter, one terrorist associate was killed while two policemen were injured. The injured policemen were immediately shifted to the nearby hospital for treatment, where doctors said their condition was stable," the officials said.

The killed terrorist associate has been identified as Altaf Lalli of the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) outfit.

Another operation against terrorists is going on in the Basantgarh area of the Udhampur district.

A paratrooper identified as Havaldar Jhantu Ali Sheikh was killed in this encounter on Thursday. Officials said the operation is going on in the area.

The massive anti-terrorist operation in Baisaran meadow of Pahalgam entered its fourth day on Friday.

The tech-assisted operation using drones, helicopters, etc., was started to trace and hunt down the terrorists responsible for the killings of 26 civilians, including 25 tourists and a local. The tourists were singled out for their religion and brutally killed in front of their families.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, in his first reaction to the Pahalgam terror attack, said in Bihar on Thursday that the terrorists responsible for the Pahalgam attack, their handlers and backers would get such punishment which they would not even have imagined. "The time has come to destroy the shrinking space of these terrorists and their backers. We will chase them to the ends of the earth", the PM said in English to convey a message to the World.

J&K Lt Governor Manoj Sinha said on Friday that the Union home minister has given clear orders that whatever might is required must be used to destroy the perpetrators of terror.

- IANS