Question: I need to create a REST based web service where the request will be handled asynchronously.
By asynchronous, I mean that the client will make the request and continue with its execution with out waiting for the response from the service.Is it possible to achieve this?
I need to deploy the service in WebSphere Application Server.

Answer: 
So I am not sure if your question is about how to do asynchronous processing on the server, or how to handle asynchronous operations in a RESTful manner. If it is the latter, then here is a summary of the approach suggested at: <http://restcookbook.com/Resources/asynchroneous-operations/>

Code your service method to 

* (a) handle the requested operation asynchronously (using a separate
thread most likely).
* (b) Immediately return a response code of 202-Accepted
* (c) In the response body, return a URI that represents the status of the requested operation.

Then code your client to:

* (a) Call the main service method. When the response is completed, if the response code is 202, note the URI returned in the body.
* (b) In a background thread, periodically poll that URI, until it returns an indication that the operation is complete.
Yes, you could create a Thread which calls your REST service. Maybe you could see how to achieve this here:

<http://docs.oracle.com/javase/tutorial/essential/concurrency/runthread.html>