Normal life was affected in Kashmir Valley on Wednesday in response to a shutdown call from separatists to protest against brutal killing of three youngsters whose bodies were found in an orchard in north Kashmir’s Pattan area on Monday. The bodies bore torture marks and bullet wounds and had been thrown in the orchard after the murders.
Police earlier said that the killings were the result of inter-group rivalry between Hizbul Mujahideen (HM) and its breakaway faction lashkar-e-Islam (leI). The HM claimed that the trio has been killed in police custody.
Shops, business establishments, educational institutions and courts remained closed while the Kashmir University had postponed all its examinations. The public transport was generally off the roads but private vehicles plied normally. This affected the attendance in Government and semi-Government offices.
Protests had erupted in Pattan and Palhalan areas of north Kashmir after the bodies were found. Even as incidents of stone-pelting took place in some interiors of Palhalan on Wedneday, the situation remained by and large peaceful in the north Kashmir region. Senior Superintendent of Police Baramulla Mir Suhail said that no untoward incident was reported from any place in the area.
Hurriyat Conference faction led by Syed Ali Geelani had called for shutdown. Geelani continued to remain house-arrested while his aides Ashraf Sehrai, Nayeem Khan, Shabir Shah were also detained. The JKlF Chairman Yasin Malik was detained by police at Tarzoo near Sopore on Tuesday while on his way to visit the bereaved families. He has been lodged at Sopore police station.
Both factions of Hurriyat, JKlF and women separatist group Dukhtaran-e-Millat have described the deaths as alleged cold blooded murders by the Special Operations Group of State Police. Police claims that two of the three bodies were of militants belonging to leI. The Hizb chief Syed Salahuddin said in a statement that the slain youngsters were the cadre of his outfit and blamed the police for killing them in custody. He denied existence of leI.
However, in July Salahuddin had claimed that leI was an outfit working for the Indian interests. The outfit hit headlines after it attempted to ban mobile telephony in north Kashmir. Its cadre shot dead at least six persons, mostly former militants and people associated with mobile telecommunication trade. One of their targets was a close aide of Geelani.
This was the third shutdown in Kashmir Valley sponsored by separatists in past 10 days. The previous shutdowns were in protest against High Court’s decision to ban the sale and possession of beef in Jammu and Kashmir (on August 12) and over the alleged denial of relief package to the flood victims on September 7, the first anniversary of devastating Kashmir floods of 2014. The common people and political groups cutting across separatist and mainstream divide have demanded impartial investigation into these killings.