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| Kashmiris shout pro-freedom slogans during the funeral of Moulvi Shoukat Ahmad Shah in Srinagar yesterday |
A leading cleric and moderate separatist was killed by a powerful explosion outside a mosque in Kashmir yesterday, police said.
Moulvi Shoukat Ahmad Shah was entering a mosque in Kashmir’s main city of Srinagar for Friday prayers when the blast took place, leaving him critically injured, a police officer said.
Shah, who had survived several previous attempts on his life, was rushed to hospital where doctors pronounced him dead on arrival. There were no immediate claims of responsibility but police blamed the killing on rebels fighting New Delhi’s rule in the Himalayan territory.
Police said the killing had sparked tension in Srinagar.
Chief Minister Omar Abdullah announced heightened security in Kashmir following the attack.
“We are looking at all aspects to determine who is responsible (for Shah’s killing),” Abdullah said on micro-blogging site Twitter, adding that he prayed that “cool heads prevail”.
Preliminary investigations suggested Shah was killed by a home-made bomb attached to a bicycle outside the mosque, a police officer said, asking that his name not be used.
“Mangled parts of a bicycle were lying at the scene,” he said.
Shah was regarded by observers in Kashmir as a moderate separatist leader and was close to Yaseen Malik, head of the pro-independence Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front.
“I found Shah lying in a pool of blood immediately after the deafening explosion,” witness Mohamed Ashraf said at the scene.
Shah is the second high-profile moderate separatist to be killed in the past decade in Kashmir, where an insurgency has been underway against Indian rule for more than 20 years.
In 2002, prominent separatist leader Abdul Gani Lone, who had sought to bring peace to the troubled Himalayan region, was assassinated by gunmen at a rally. Shah was in favour of independence for Kashmir, unlike many militants who are seeking the territory’s union with Pakistan.
Thousands of people shouting religious and pro-freedom slogans attended prayers in the centre of Srinagar before Shah was taken for burial.
“Security forces have been deployed in strength in sensitive areas as a precautionary measure to maintain law and order,” the police officer said.
Last summer, Kashmir was rocked by street protests against Indian rule that left 114 people dead - most of them shot by security forces.
Yesterday’s explosion was the first major blast in Srinagar in the last two years. In September 2009, three people were killed and 18 injured when rebels used a car bomb to blow up a police vehicle in the city.
Shah will be buried at the Martyrs’ Graveyard at Eidgah grounds in the Old City, sources said.