’10 Kg RDX was used in the blast’
Poonch: The office of a senior revenue official was destroyed in an explosion in border district of Poonch in Jammu and Kashmir, official sources told GNS on Wednesday.
Official sources told GNS that last night at around 1:15 am, a powerful explosion, triggered by an Improvised Explosive Device (IED) rocked the office of Naib Tehsildar Assistant Collector First Class Bhimber Gali (BG) Balakote located at BG Dhargalol in Mendhar Tehsil of the district.
“The blast completely destroyed the one storey building comprising of four rooms while the official record has also been lost. It was intense and created fear among residents,” witnesses and locals told GNS.
Officials said ’10 kilogram of RDX was used in the blast along with Nitrate 2′. “The samples which have collected from the spot suggest that it was an IED blast,” official sources said.
“We are looking into the incident. The investigations are on and we are collecting samples,” the Additional SP Poonch Amit Gupta said.
The charge of the Naib Tehsildar post was vacant since more than two months while Aftab Ahmad Shah, who is Naib Tehsildar Mendhar, had been given additional charge of the post, official sources said.
They said Qazi Muneer was appointed yesterday for the vacant post and he was scheduled to join duty today on Wednesday.
Besides, a Patwari Amjad Naseer and a class fourth employee Talib Hussain are working in the office, which has been completely destroyed now.
To take stock of the situation, the senior civil, police and army officials rushed to the spot. The officials include Sub-Divisional Police Officer (SDPO) Mendhar Surrendar Chowdhary, Sub-District Magistrate (SDM) Ramesh Kumar, Tehsildar Mendhar Muhammad Rafiq Shah, Naib Tehsildar Mendhar, Aftab Ahmad Shah, Commander Officer 37 RR Colonel Satindra Singh, Colonel KP Mishra of 49 RR, Deputy Commander 13 Sector Colonel T C Malhotra and 120 Brigade Commander.
Interestingly, the camp of army’s 105 TA unit camp is around 100 meters away from the Naib Tehsildar Office.
The Additional Deputy Commissioner (ADC) Poonch Arvind Sharma also visited the spot.
Talib Hussain, who is an employee in the office, was detained by police for questioning, official had sources said.