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Ravi Dhaliwal
Tribune News Service
Pathankot, May 4
In a “secret” operation at night, the NIA and the Pathankot police took out the bodies of all four terrorists killed in the January 2 Pathankot Air Force station attack from the Civil Hospital mortuary and buried these at an undisclosed destination.
Heavy security is still deployed in and around the mortuary despite the fact that the corpses were shifted around 1 am today. A top ranking officer said, “The bodies have been taken out but we do not want information to be leaked due to security reasons. We cannot disclose the exact destination where the burial has taken place.”
As per norms, bodies are supposed to be accompanied by a “maulvi” (Muslim priest) and a local administration officer for the burial. However, no officer was willing to comment on whether this was taken into account in this case.
When questioned over the issue, SSP Rakesh Kaushal, Civil Surgeon Dr Ajay Bagga, Senior Medical Officer (SMO) Dr Bhupinder Singh, IG Lok Nath Angra remained tight-lipped.
The bodies of the three Dinanagar terrorists too had been clandestinely shifted from the Gurdaspur civil hospital late at night with the police refusing to divulge details.
For over four months, the corpses had been lying at the mortuary, forcing the Civil Surgeon to write to his seniors many times requesting them to give permission to take them out. Space constraints were being cited as the main reason for the shifting. On April 28, an officer of the Additional SP rank of the NIA, Vaibhav Srivastva, had visited the hospital with his team members to take DNA samples for the second time since January 3, the day the bodies were brought to the hospital. At that time, he had assured the hospital authorities that the shifting could take place any time.
Six days later, the NIA and the Pathankot Police, in a joint operation, reportedly swung into action for the burial. Rumours were rife late yesterday evening about the operation but these were scotched by senior police officers.
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