SRINAGAR: Militants attacked an army patrol in India-held Kashmir on Thursday, leaving three soldiers and four civilians dead in an ongoing gunbattle, security officials said.

A group of heavily armed militants attacked the army column near a base in the town of Arnia, about four kilometres from the undisputed, internationally-recognised border with Pakistan.

“The civilian death toll is four now,” the inspector general of police for the region, Rajesh Kumar, said.

“Three of our soldiers were martyred in the operation which is still ongoing,” army spokesman for the area, Manish Mehta, said.

Mr Kumar said three militants had been shot dead in the gunbattle so far and at least one militant was believed to be holed up as security forces tightened the cordon of the area using floodlights for the night.

“We will resume the search tomorrow (Friday) morning,” Mr Kumar said.

The civilians were killed in the crossfire during the attack which began early in the morning, local deputy inspector general of police Shakeel Beig said.

The militants entered an “abandoned bunker” which Indian forces then surrounded, triggering the gunbattle.

Mr Beig had earlier said “four to six militants” were firing from inside the bunker.

The attack comes a day before Prime Minister Narendra Modi is expected to address a campaign rally in the nearby town of Udhampur for ongoing elections in the disputed region.

Mr Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party is striving to win power in the region for the first time.

Earlier, the region’s chief minister, Omar Abdullah, expressed his condolences over the first soldier’s death, while pointing to the timing of the attack.

“The timing of the attack in Arnia can’t be a coincidence. My condolences to the family of the army officer killed in Arnia,” he said on Twitter.

Published in Dawn, November 28th, 2014