SRINAGAR – Occupied Jammu and Kashmir Police has put a red alert across theValley following inputs about Jaish-e-Mohammed (JeM) planning a siege onthe hanging anniversary of Afzal Guru.

The Hurriyat has also called for a shutdown (bandh) on February 9 to markGuru’s death anniversary and pay tributes to him.

Afzal Guru was a resident of Doibagh in Baramulla’s Sopore district and washanged in New Delhi’s Tihar Jail on February 9, 2013 in secrecy and thenburied there itself.

Guru was held for 2001 Parliament attacklink>thatclaimed the lives of six Delhi Police, two Parliament security servicepersonnel and a gardener.

The separatists have called the bandh in honour of another separatistMaqbool Bhat, who was the co-founder of Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front.Bhat was hanged in Tihar Jail on February 11, 1984.

According to an official communication flashed to all seniorsuperintendents of police (SSPs), terror organisation JeM might strike anyday between February 5-11 as sign of respect to Guru and Bhat.

“The death anniversary of Afzal Guru and Maqbool Bhat falls on February 9and 11 respectively. So, militants may carry out grenade attacks on forcesand may resort to IED blasts as well,” reads the official letter.

The document further states that a high level vigil needs to be maintainedfor the stipulated period from 11pm-6am.

“All district SSPs will brief their officers/men on ground and other sisteragencies regarding the threat perception” during this period. “We need totake all preventive measures to thwart the nefarious designs of themilitants, the document reads.

A senior police official, privy to the input, said that there is everypossibility that the Afzal Guru Squad (AGS) of Jaish-e-Mohammed may strikeanywhere in Kashmir by or before Guru’s death anniversary.