SRINAGAR: It is now officially confirmed that the third militant killed in an encounter with security forces in Jammu and Kashmir’s Southern Anantnag district late on Sunday night was from Telangana and has been identified as M.D. Toufeeq.

A resident of Bhadradri-Kothagudem district of Telangana, 26-year-old Toufeeq  followed the Islamic State (ISIS) ideology and had come to Kashmir last year to join militancy, J&K director general of police Shesh Paul Vaid said after receiving confirmation of the slain man’s antecedents from his Telangana counterpart.

The senior superintendent of police, Anantnag, had earlier flashed a letter to the DGP of Telangana informing him about the killing of three militants in the encounter in the district’s Hakura village and seeking the information on the third militant who, he said, was probably from Hyderabad.

The letter said, “It has been circulated in social media that one terrorist amongst the three is from Hyderabad. The relevant details circulated in social media are (he is) Mohammad Taufeeq alias Sultan Zabul Al Hind alias Abu Zarr Al Hindi who had come over to the Valley in 2017 from Hyderabad (probably Khamam).”

The Telangana police has, while responding to the request from J&K police, confirmed the militant killed with two others Eisa Fazili and Syed Ovais Shafi — both local Kashmiris-at Hakura was a resident of that state’s Bhadradri-Kothagundem district.