The planned phased withdrawal of the Army from certain areas of the Jammu region has been shelved “indefinitely” in view of terror attacks being orchestrated from across the border, officials said in Srinagar.
They said the government had planned to reduce the footprints of Rashtriya Rifles, a counter-insurgency force of the Army, in the Jammu region and hand over the security to the Jammu Kashmir Police and paramilitary forces.
The Army has three Counter-Insurgent Forces (CIF) in the Jammu region — Delta Force (which looks after the Doda region), Romeo Force (looking after Rajouri and Poonch areas) and Uniform Force (looking after Udhampur and Banihal areas).
Some units of the Army had planned to gradually hand over the security and law and order management to the local police and paramilitary units in South of Pir Panjal (Jammu region), the officials said.
However, keeping the situation in mind, especially the killings by terrorists this year, it has been decided to shelve the proposal “indefinitely”, the officials said
The proposal to withdraw the Army from the hinterland was under discussion for some time and a final recommendation was to be taken at the Unified Headquarters (UHQ) headed by Lt Governor of Jammu Kashmir Manoj Sinha. The UHQ has top representatives from the Army, police and paramilitary forces.
Post abrogation of Article 370 on August 5, 2019, the law and order and terror-related incidents had shown a decline with the number of stone pelting incidents reduced to zero. PTI