SRINAGAR: At least two suspected rebels were killed late Friday in Indian Kashmir in a gun battle with government forces, a day after a polling officer was killed in election violence, police said.

The gun battle started when government forces laid a siege around Manloo village, 55 kilometres (34 miles) south of the main city of Srinagar, after receiving information about the presence of three militants who fired at them.

“Two terrorists were killed in the encounter. The third may or may not have died yet in the operation,” Nalin Prabhat, inspector general of the federal Central Reserve Force told AFP.

An Indian army officer was also “critically injured” in the gun battle, a top police officer told AFP on condition of anonymity, adding that the operation was suspended for the night.

Late on Thursday suspected rebels ambushed a government vehicle in the area that was carrying polling officials back at the end of voting, killing a polling officer and injuring five others including three government forces personnel.

Anantnag constituency in southern Kashmir valley, where a separatist movement is centred, polled Thursday in the ongoing marathon Indian elections amid dozens of protests and rebel warnings to the people to stay away from voting.

The turnout was low at 28 per cent of the total electorate.

About a dozen rebel groups have been fighting Indian forces since 1989 for independence or merger of the territory with Pakistan.

Although violence has declined during the last decade but the fighting has left tens of thousands of people, mostly civilians, dead.

Kashmir is divided between India and Pakistan since their independence from Britain in 1947, and both the countries claim the Himalayan territory in full.