\Reiterating its commitment to the promise of zero tolerance to human rights violations, the Army on Tuesday ordered probe into the mysterious disappearance of three civilians in north Kashmir’s Kupwara district. The police have arrested a local Territorial Army soldier who was in contact with the trio before they went missing on November 17.
“Army has ordered an inquiry into the missing case of three men”, General Officer Commanding of Srinagar based XV Corps lt Gen. Satish Kumar Dua said on the sidelines of a function here. The function was organised to welcome a group of girl students from Srinagar district that toured various Indian cities and met Human Resources Minister Smriti Irani. The girls and their teachers were on a “motivational tour” under Army’s “operation Sadbhavna” that seeks to bridge the gap between common people and the Army in embattled Kashmir.
Dua said Army is committed to zero tolerance on human rights violations and if Army’s role is established in the incident, a tangible action will follow.
Three civilians — Ghulam Jeelani Khatana (42), Mir Hussain Khatana (45), residents of Gojar Patti (Satbonya) in Dardpora and Ali Muhammad Sheikh (40) of Dolipora Trehgam have gone missing since they were taken away by a local soldier Manzoor Ahmad Khowaja of 160 Battalion Territorial Army. Since November 17 when they were last seen with the soldier, the whereabouts of the trio are not known.
The family members of the missing trio filed separate reports in police stations of Kralpora and Trehgam on November 28. Police registered a case against the accused soldier and manhunt was launched to nab him. He was later arrested and produced in Kupwara court. He is on police remand till December 19.
On Monday, shutdown was observed in Trehgam township as hundreds of protesters staged demonstrations against the authorities’ alleged failure to trace the missing villagers. The people alleged that the probe was going on at a snail’s pace and they were apprehensive about the well-being of the missing civilians.
Speaking on the encounter in Manigah forests of Kupwara where militants engaged security forces for more than three weeks and killed a Commanding Officer, lt Gen Dua said that army called off the operation to reduce inconvenience to the local population. “We don’ want to create inconvenience to the residents there and in this regard we have called off the encounter but on initial level it is going on,” he said.
On the sadhbhavna tour of girls he said despite severe criticism they carried on with the tour. “In ten days of tour, the girls visited Agra, Parliament House and met with HRD Minister, Smriti Irani, and visited several universities and colleges, which will boost them in future,” GoC said.
He said that there was not any kind of controversy during planning of tour but after the girls went to tour the controversy took place on social networking sites, which is not bound in any aspect.