New Delhi:

Targeted killings of Hindus and migrant workers by terrorists in Jammu and Kashmir “will not deter” the government from its work in the union territory, a senior administration official told NDTV on Friday.

“The targeted killings show the level of desperation. Our system will deal with it. This wave of killings will stop. It happened in October last year as well,” the official said, asking not to be named .

The statement gave an overview of the government’s plan to tackle the wave of attacks in the Union Territory which have targeted mainly non-locals and Kashmiri Pandits.

“Tourists can be killed if they target non-locals. Anyone can be attacked. They will also target Muslims,” ​​the official said.

Rejecting calls from Kashmiri Pandits to lift the blockades on their settlements and allow them to leave Kashmir, he said, “We will not transfer Kashmiri Pandits to Jammu. We cannot participate in any ethnic cleansing. We believe in a multicultural society. . We will move working Kashmiri Pandits to safer places.”

Suggesting the government was keen for things to work as they are, he said: ‘Elections will be held whenever the electoral commission decides. There is a democratic system…a few killings here and there won’t deter us. not.”

“There is no evidence of the Taliban [being behind these attacks]. This is not jihad. This is done by some activists. Pakistan is behind all these attacks. There is an attempt to create chaos,” the official said.

“We don’t want a small group of people trying to create a narrative that only they can run the state and go back to the old system,” he added, apparently referring to local parties in Jammu. -and-Kashmir who strongly criticized the government for the killings.

The comments came a day after a Hindu bank manager and a worker were shot and killed in Kashmir, as a wave of targeted killings prompted more Hindu families to flee the government-ruled territory. the BJP in the center.

Bank manager Vijay Kumar was attacked by a terrorist at a branch of Ellaquai Dehati bank in Kulgam, south Kashmir, where a schoolteacher was shot dead on Tuesday, local police said.

“He was shot and seriously injured in this terrorist incident,” Kashmir police said in a tweet, later adding that Kumar, who hails from the state of West Rajasthan, died of his injuries.

In a separate incident, terrorists fired on two non-local laborers in Budgam district on Thursday, a police official said.

“Militants shot two outside workers working at a brick kiln in the Chadoora neighborhood of Budgam. They were transferred to a nearby medical facility for treatment, where one died,” he said. declared.