Faktoo, an anchor for the state-owned Doordarshan television station in Srinagar, Kashmir, was assassinated, reportedly by militant separatists, who fired two shots at the journalist with a gun equipped with a silencer. He had received repeated threats from militant separatists because of his work and had been kidnapped and detained by a militant group in 1994.
Faktoo had aired pro-government news reports that criticized the separatist movement. Shortly before his death, he started working for a news program about Kashmir that is broadcast by satellite throughout India, but not in Kashmir. He was the seventh journalist assassinated in Kashmir since the militant movement began in 1989 and the third to be specifically targeted because of his work with the state-owned broadcast media.