The Jammu and Kashmir government on Sunday arrested two police officials and attached a district police chief and his deputy in connection with the 'mysterious disappearance of a local villager' in Srinagar.

A police spokesman said in Srinagar on Sunday evening that Farooq Ahmad Gudoo, assistant sub-inspector of police, and Farooq Ahmad Paddar, a selection grade constable, had been arrested in connection with the disappearance of a villager identified as Abdul Rehman Paddar, a resident of Larnoo village near the south Kashmir health resort of Kokernag in Anantnag district.

He said family members of Abdul Rehman Padroo lodged a missing report on January 23, 2007, with Batmaloo police station in Srinagar.

The report said Rehman had gone missing from the Batmaloo area of the city on December 8, last year.

The FIR also said Rehman was in possession of a mobile phone when he went missing.

The police has recovered Rehman's mobile phone from the possession of a youth who told investigators that he had been given the mobile phone by police Assistant Sub-inspector Farooq Ahmad Gudoo presently posted in counterinsurgency, Special Operations Group of the Jammu and Kashmir police in Ganderbal district.

The government on Sunday evening also ordered attachment of H R Parihar, SP Ganderbal, and Bahadur Ram, deputy SP (SOG) Ganderbal, to the office of the Kashmir zone Police Chief S M Sahai.

The inquiry into the missing youth's fate would now be conducted by Farooq Ahmad, deputy inspector general of police, central Kashmir range.

Sources close to the family allege that Abdul Rehman Padroo, had been framed as a foreign militant and killed in a fake encounter on December 9 last year at Waskura village in the adjoining Ganderbal district.

"We have entrusted the case to a senior police officer to unearth the truth," said a senior state government officer in Srinagar.