Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind (AGH) has named Hameed Lelhari as itsnew chief and Zakir Musa’s successor in Kashmir, a media report said on Friay.
Lelhari (30) is a resident of Pulwama district in southKashmir.
Lelhari is believed to have served Musa as his deputy afterhe along with a group of around a dozen of militants split from HizbulMujahideen and swore allegiance to al-Qaida in July 2017.
“In a new video released on Wednesday by al-Hurr (officialmedia wing of AGH), which was widely circulated on Whatsapp groups, Abu UbaidahHafizahullah, spokesperson of AGH said that Lelhari alias Haroon Abbas hasreplaced Musa while Ghazi Ibrahim Khalid appointed as his deputy,” reported TheTimes of India.
The report said that Jammu and Kashmir police officialsconfirmed the veracity of the claim in the video.
“Lelhari has taken over AGH but he is hardly a topmilitant,” TOI quoted an officer as having said.
The report said that Lelhari is son of Mohammad Ismail Loneand was born in 1990. He is a native of Lelhar Kakpora, Pulwama.
It said that he has received schooling at Evergreen PublicSchool Lelhar.
“He did his eighth class from Government Middle SchoolKakpora. Lelhari dropped out of school, police sources said due to somedomestic problems following which he worked as a labourer, a cook and a mason,”the report said.
Zakir Musa was killed in a gunfight with the security forcesin Tral area of Pulwama district on May 23 this year.