New Delhi: Twenty CRPF personnel were killed and 40 others were left critically injured after a suicide bomber rammed a car into the army convoy in in Awantipora town of Pulwama district on Thursday.
Today's attack is one of the biggest militant attacks in Kashmir in the last two decades. The last time a car bombing of such magnitude happened was in 2001 when JeM carried out a suicide bomb attack outside the Srinagar secretariat killing 38 people and injuring 40 others.
This attack, however, is only the second 'suicide' car bomb attack in the valley. In May 2000, Afaq Ahmed Shah, a class 12 student blew himself, along with his Maruti car, to attack the 15 Corps headquarters in Badami Bagh Cantonment.
But this is not the first time that a car/vehicle was used to carry out an attack by the militants in the valley. According to South Asia Terrorism portal (SATP), this is the 11th major attack where a vehicle was used by the militants to carry out an attack. The last such attack took place in 2009 in Srinagar when militants had blown up a police vehicle by triggering a car bomb.
Here's a timeline of major fidayeen attacks in which explosion-laden vehicles were used:
2009
September 12: The militants blew up a police vehicle by triggering a massive car bomb, killing two police personnel and a woman and injuring 10 others outside the Central jail in the Rainawari area of the Srinagar.
2005
November 2: A few hours before the swearing in of Ghulam Nabi Azad as the tenth Chief Minister (CM) of Jammu and Kashmir, a Fidayeen (suicide squad) terrorist detonated a powerful car bomb in the Nowgam area of capital Srinagar near the old residence of outgoing CM, Mufti Mohammad Sayeed, killing at least 10 people and injuring 18 others.
November 16: Four civilians are killed and 72 persons, including legislator and former Minister Usman Majeed, sustained injuries in a powerful car bomb explosion near the main entrance of the J&K Bank Corporate Headquarters in Srinagar. The Al-Arifeen, believed to be a front outfit of the LeT, claimed responsibility for the blast.
July 20: A Major of the Indian Army and two soldiers were among five people who died and 17 persons were wounded when a suspected suicide bomber rammed an explosive-laden car into an Army vehicle near Burnhall School in the high-security civil lines area of Srinagar.
June 13: At least 13 civilians, including two schoolchildren, and three officers of the Central Reserve Police Force were killed and over a 100 people sustain injuries when an explosives-laden car blew up at a crowded marketplace in front of a Government school in the Pulwama township of south Kashmir.
May 11: At least two persons were killed and 50 others sustained injuries when terrorists triggered a car bomb explosion in the Jawahar Nagar area of capital Srinagar. Over a dozen vehicles and approximately 40 shops, bank branches and residential houses were damaged in the blast. The HM, Al-Nasireen and Jammu and Kashmir Islamic Front claimed responsibility for the blast in separate statements.
2003
September 6: Seven civilians were killed and 32 others injured in a car bomb explosion at the main entrance of a fruit market on the national highway by-pass in Parimpora, outskirts of the capital city of Srinagar.
2000
December 25: Four SF personnel and the lone suicide terrorist driving the bomb laden car and four civilians are killed in the second suicide car bomb attack on army headquarters at Badami Bagh, Srinagar.
August 10: 14 persons were killed in a car bomb explosion in Srinagar.
April 19: In the first human bomb attack in the State, a JeM terrorist exploded a car laden with explosives outside an Army Head Quarters in Srinagar injuring four persons.
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