SRINAGAR, Aug 30: A policeman was injured in an attack by militants on a state minister’s rally in occupied Kashmir, while Indian troops killed four militants in three separate clashes, police said on Tuesday.

Irrigation Minister Qazi Afzal’s political rally was attacked on Tuesday with two grenades near the town of Patan, 30 kilometers north of Srinagar, a police spokesman said.

He said one of the grenades hit a policeman guarding the venue while the second did not explode.

The minister, who is also a leading politician in the state’s ruling Peoples Democratic Party, was whisked away swiftly by his security guards along with another PDP leader Iftikhar Hussain Ansari.

“The minister is safe,” the spokesman said.

On Sunday Kashmir’s forest minister survived a militant attack in the northern town of Handwara.

Among the militants killed, police said, was rebel commander Mushtaq Ahmed alias Chootu who had been evading arrest for more than six years.

Chootu, linked to the region’s most powerful group Hizbul Mujahideen, was killed by troops late Monday during a clash in the southern district of Anantnag, a police spokesman said.

Three other rebels were shot dead in the districts of Anantnag and Udhampur late Monday, police said.—AFP