The security forces searched for militants in Machil area of north Kashmir’s Kupwara district for the second consecutive day on Monday.
Defence officials said that massive searches were underway in the area where four soldiers and three militants were killed on Sunday.
Additional Director General of BSF, Surinder Pawar, said that infiltration has been plugged to a large extent this year. “Till this time last year around 140 militants had sneaked in and this year till now around 30 militant succeeded in sneaking in,” Pawar told reporters on the sidelines of the wreath laying ceremony of BSF soldier Sudhir Sarkar who was killed in the Machil encounter on Sunday.
He said that the BSF party challenged the militants and early morning Sunday Army reinforcements joined them. Later, Army captain Ashutosh Kumar and two soldiers were also killed. “We had input about a possible infiltration bid,” he said, adding that the BSF party noticed the suspicious movement of militants on the intervening night of November 7 and 8.
The body of the BSF personnel was later flown to his native Tripura state.