Overview
- Search teams recovered the bullet‑riddled bodies of two Special Police Officers about 1–2 km from their last known location early Thursday after locals reported gunfire the previous afternoon.
- The dead were identified as Babi Chand and Rashpal Kumar and both their service weapons—reported as an INSAS and a .303 rifle with magazines and ammunition—were missing from the scene.
- Investigators reported finding empty Pakistani‑origin armour‑piercing steel‑core cartridge cases at the site and are treating a militant motive as probable while probing links to Lashkar‑e‑Taiba and local overground networks.
- A large joint manhunt by J&K Police, the Army’s 17 Rashtriya Rifles and the CRPF is under way using helicopters, drones, sniffer dogs and blockades to comb the forested Dachhan/Marwah area.
- The killings highlight persistent security and operational challenges in Kishtwar’s remote, forested terrain and raise immediate concerns that captured service rifles could be reused in future militant attacks and further threaten local patrols and communities.