Srinagar: In a new worry to the forces, a new jihadi group linked to the Al-Qaida has been formed in Kashmir. It will be headed by radical Kashmiri militant Zakir Musa, announced an affiliate information channel of the terror group on Thursday.

Srinagar: In a new worry to the forces, a new jihadi group linked to the Al-Qaida has been formed in Kashmir. It will be headed by radical Kashmiri militant Zakir Musa, announced an affiliate information channel of the terror group on Thursday.

A message from the new militant group, Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind, says “a new movement of jihad has been formed and we will liberate our home land Kashmir.”

“For this goal, a new movement of jihad has been founded by the companions of martyr Burhan Wani under the leadership of Mujahid Zakir Musa,” the message read. It also said that the official media of Ansar Ghazwat-ul-Hind was named Al-Hurr.

It is for the first time in nearly three decades of militancy that a Kashmiri militant has been linked to the global militant group.

The J&K Police said they were examining the claim and its impact in the region.

“There is an announcement… we are examining it and the impact it will have here. Definitely, all this indicates a shift in the ideology,” state police chief Shesh Paul Vaid told The Tribune.

A senior Army officer in the counter-insurgency grid said it was too early to make any analysis of the development.

Twentyfive-year-old Zakir Rashid Bhat, alias Musa, of Tral in south Kashmir studied engineering at a Chandigarh college before he joined militancy. He replaced militant commander Burhan Wani, but developed differences with the group as he toed the hardline Islamist agenda and disapproved of fighting for any nationalist agenda. He was later expelled by the Hizbul Mujahideen, an indigenous militant group, after he threatened Hurriyat leaders. Soon after his expulsion, global jihadist outfit Al-Qaida came to his support on Islamic struggle.

Both Lashkar-e-Toiba and Pakistan-based commander of the Hizbul Mujahideen and chairman of United Jihad Council Syed Salahuddin have maintained their distance from any global agenda and rejected the Al-Qaida and ISIS-type organisations.

Salahuddin, who was named by the US as a global terrorist, said their fight was only within the boundaries of the state and termed it an “Indian ploy” to demonise and fail the “Kashmiris’ struggle”.