Srinagar, Oct 10 (IANS) The body of the second Indian Army soldier, who went missing due to adverse weather conditions during an anti-terrorist operation, was recovered on Friday.

Of the two missing Army para-commandos, one body was recovered on Thursday.

Officials said that following relentless efforts by security forces, the body of the second para-commando has been recovered on Friday morning from the Gadole forest area of South Kashmir’s Anantnag district.

Officials said two para-commandos went missing five days back due to bad weather in Gadole forests and today during searches the body of the second soldier was recovered.

The Army’s Srinagar headquartered Chinar Corps said on X yesterday, “On the intervening night of 6/7 Oct an operational team on Kishtwar range confronted a severe snow storm and white out conditions in the mountains of South Kashmir.

“Since then, two soldiers have gone out of communication. Intense Search and Rescue operations have been launched but hampered due to prevailing adverse weather conditions.”

The joint forces including the Army, security forces and J&K Police have been carrying out aggressive operations against terrorists, their Over Ground Workers (OGWs) and sympathisers in order to dismantle the entire ecosystem of terror in the Union Territory, rather than focussing only on the elimination of the gun-wielding terrorists.

Drug smugglers, peddlers and those engaged in hawala money rackets are also on the scanner of the security forces as it is believed that the fund generated by these operations are used to sustain terrorism in J&K.

Security forces and J&K Police carry out anti-terrorist operations in the hinterland while the Army and the Border Security Force (BSF) guard the Line of Control (LoC) and the International Border (IB) respectively.

J&K has a 740-km long LoC and 240-km long IB. The LoC is in Baramulla, Kupwara and Bandipora districts of the Valley and partly in Jammu district. The IB is in Jammu, Samba and Kathua districts of Jammu division.

–IANS

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