Police allege that Bhat, before being arrested from Srinagar in 2007, had the overall responsibility of Hizb operations in Jammu and Kashmir.

For the three years he held the operations commander post, he is believed to have coordinated and conducted a string of bombings and shootouts, which claimed hundreds of lives.

Police say he has about three dozen cases pending against him.

A resident of Arwani village in south Kashmir's Anantnag, Bhat first crossed over to Pakistan in August 1991 for arms training and had been active since then. He had worked as a transport in-charge for the militant group for four years in Pakistan-administered Kashmir and also served as Hizb chief and chairman of the United Jehad Council Syed Sallahuddin's driver.

Police records say that Bhat infiltrated back into Kashmir in 1999 and was made divisional commander of Poonch and Rajouri districts. A close confidant of Sallahuddin, Bhat in 2004 was tasked to revive the Hizb militant group after it lost a series of top commanders in counter-terrorism operations in 2002 and 2003.

The source said that Bhat's 'unexpected release and the subsequent disappearance' has shocked the state security establishment because it is believed that he has the 'capability and a strong base to rejuvenate the militant outfit in the state', where the level of violence has remarkably receded in the last few years.