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Jammu and Kashmir largely shut down yesterday and hundreds of police were deployed in the troubled state’s main city after the weekend shooting of two civilians by the army, a police chief said. |
The shutdown to protest against the shootings came as a police officer and a militant were killed in a separate incident south of the main city Srinagar, said Kashmir’s police chief Abdul Gani Mir.
The officer and the rebel died in the village of Mandoora, 35km from Srinagar, during a gun battle that also wounded three soldiers, the police chief said.
“We launched an operation based on intelligence of the presence of militants in the area,” Mir said.
“One of our boys was martyred in the operation,” Mir said, also confirming the death of the rebel.
In Srinagar shops and other businesses, along with schools, were closed and traffic was light after a separatist group called for a strike to protest at the weekend killings.
The state was tense after the weekend shootings in which soldiers opened fire on angry villagers, killing one. The villagers had been protesting against the shooting of a teenager by the military just hours earlier during a hunt for militants in Markondal village north of Srinagar.
Hundreds of police and paramilitary troops were deployed in the inner parts of Srinagar yesterday to try to prevent protests, while a curfew was imposed on parts of the region.
Despite the curfew, hundreds of villagers in the northern town of Hajin took to the streets, shouting anti-India slogans, while some tried to torch an army-run school.
“Curfew is strictly implemented. The area is calm now,” police superintendent Bashir Khan said.
The army runs “goodwill” schools across the state as part of an operation aimed at “winning the hearts and minds” of people who deeply resent their presence in populated areas.
Police have launched an investigation into the weekend shootings. The army has started its own probe, after describing both incidents as regrettable.
The condemnation of the killing of two innocent people has been widespread - the ruling National Conference, the opposition People’s Democratic Party and the Congress have all expressed regret and blamed the army.
Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, who was to give away prizes to winners of the Mughal Road Car Rally on Sunday, cancelled the appointment following the tragic incident.
In a separate incident, soldiers shot and killed a man at Saujaya in Poonch district who may have been carrying explosives from across the Pakistani side of the Line of Control, an army spokesman said.
“When our troops fired at him an explosion occurred. A badly mutilated body was found on the spot,” Colonel Rajesh Kalia said.
About a dozen armed groups have been fighting Indian forces since 1989 for Kashmir’s independence or for its merger with Pakistan.
Tens of thousands of people, mostly civilians, have died in the fighting.