AHMEDABAD, 16 June 2004 — Four suspected militants, one of them a woman, who police claimed were on a mission to kill the Hindu hard-line leader of the western Gujarat state, were shot dead early yesterday, a senior official said.
Those gunned down by police in the Sardarnagar area of Ahmedabad, commercial capital of Gujarat, included two Pakistani nationals, according to Deputy Inspector General of Police D.G. Vanzara.
All four belonged to the Lashkar-e-Taiba rebel group, which is battling Indian troops in the disputed region of Kashmir, and were on their way to assassinate Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, Vanzara said.
“We had come to know through our intelligence sources that four militants were headed to Ahmedabad to kill Modi. We encountered them in the morning and all four were killed. They belonged to Lakshar-e-Taiba,” he said.
An assault rifle, two pistols, some 150 to 200 rounds of ammunition, a satellite phone, 200,000 rupees ($4,400) in cash and 20 kilograms (44 pounds) of explosives were recovered from the scene of the shootout, he said.
“According to preliminary information, two of them are Pakistanis and there is one woman,” said Vanzara.
The Pakistani nationals were from Punjab province while the third man was an Indian from the western city of Pune in Maharashtra state. Vanzara said intelligence reports indicated the rebels had slipped into India through Kashmir, “with a determined bid to assassinate Modi.”
“They have been in Gujarat for the last 15 days for reconnaissance and had gathered information on Modi. We had stationed our teams at six different points in Ahmedabad to capture them,” said Vanzara.
Modi is a member of the Hindu fundamentalist Bharatiya Janata Party and was accused of failing to prevent attacks by Hindu vigilante groups on Muslims in religious riots in Gujarat two years ago.
The riots were triggered when a mob — believed to be predominantly Muslim — set fire to a train compartment carrying Hindu activists.
