The deceased include Assistant Commandant Ankit Kumar Pandey, Sub-Inspector Lakshman Singh and constables Mohd Rafiq and Sandeep Kumar. The suspected shooter was taken into custody.
BY PC Bureau
September 29: Four CISF personnel, including an Assistant Commandant, were killed after a colleague allegedly opened fire inside their camp at a hydroelectric power project in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kathua district on Tuesday evening, in what officials described as a fratricidal firing incident.
The shooting took place at around 6.40 pm at the CISF unit deployed at the Sewa hydel project in Mashka village of Basohli, close to the Himachal Pradesh border. Preliminary information suggests that an argument among personnel preceded the firing, but authorities have not established what triggered the confrontation.
The deceased have been identified as Assistant Commandant and company commander Ankit Kumar Pandey, Sub-Inspector Lakshman Singh, and constables Mohd Rafiq and Sandeep Kumar. All four were critically injured in the shooting and later succumbed to their injuries after being taken to an NHPC hospital.
The suspected shooter, a CISF head constable, was apprehended and handed over to the police. Reports have identified him as Abhidesh/Avdesh Kumar, although spellings of his name vary across initial accounts.
According to preliminary information, the head constable allegedly used his service rifle during the incident. Police secured the camp after the shooting and began investigating the circumstances surrounding the confrontation.
The CISF has ordered a court of inquiry into the incident, while the Kathua Police are conducting their own investigation. The exact motive, including the nature of the argument that reportedly preceded the firing, remains unclear.
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Shooting at remote power project
The CISF personnel were deployed to provide security at the Sewa hydroelectric project in the Basohli area. The project lies in a remote and strategically sensitive part of Kathua, near the Jammu and Kashmir-Himachal Pradesh border.
The location also presents unusual logistical challenges. According to The Indian Express, the site is geographically positioned between Basohli in Jammu and Kashmir and Chamba district in Himachal Pradesh, with access to the incident location reportedly available through Himachal Pradesh.
The circumstances are therefore being examined not only as a case of internal firing but also in terms of security arrangements, weapon handling and the chain of events inside the camp.
What remains unclear
Officials have not yet disclosed what led to the reported argument or whether there had been any earlier dispute between the personnel involved.
Nor has any official agency indicated that the shooting was connected to terrorism or an external attack. Current reports point instead to an altercation among members of the unit, followed by the alleged use of a service weapon.
The police investigation and the CISF’s court of inquiry are expected to establish the sequence of events, including how the accused obtained access to the weapon, what happened immediately before the firing and whether any procedural or security lapses contributed to the deaths.
The incident comes as a serious internal security concern for a force whose personnel are routinely entrusted with firearms while protecting critical infrastructure. The deaths of an officer, a sub-inspector and two constables make the inquiry particularly significant for determining whether the shooting was an isolated confrontation or whether wider questions about camp security and personnel management arise from it.
For now, authorities have not publicly established a motive, and the allegation that an argument triggered the shooting remains part of the preliminary account rather than a confirmed finding.
