The Jammu & Kashmir police on Friday arrested five people, who were allegedly involved in jeering and slapping at a group of Central Reserve Police Force personnel on poll duty during the bypoll to the Srinagar parliamentary seat on April 9.
After receiving a complaint from the CRPF, five persons were arrested, and a hunt was on for others seen in the video shot in Budgam district, police said. Budgam accounted for the death of seven of the eight protesters during the poll-day violence.
The by-election was marred by large scale violence as security forces shot dead eight anti-poll protesters and injured scores others. Officials said that around a hundred security forces personnel were also injured.
Sources said police questioned several youngsters belonging to Kralpora locality on the outskirts of Srinagar
for their alleged involvement
in attacking the CRPF personnel deployed in the area
on polling day.
In a video clip, the security personnel are seen leaving the area as a slogan shouting crowd waylaid the armed personnel. Even as most of the people pave way for the personnel, some youngsters slap and abuse them. The CRPF personnel maintain their cool and walk ahead. The video clip has generated debate on social media and television.
While the controversial clip was being debated, former Chief Minister Omar Abdullah uploaded another clip on his twitter handle showing a convoy of Army passing through a village in central district Budgam with a local youngster tied with ropes on the lead armoured vehicle. While the vehicle passes through the village, an announcement says that stone-throwers would meet the same fate. The youngster tied with ropes is an alleged stone pelter.
A spokesman of the Army in Srinagar said that the contents of the video clip were being verified. “The contents of the video are being verified and investigated.”
Sources said the youngster is a resident of Beerwah constituency in central district Budgam, which is represented in the legislative assembly by Omar Abdullah.
The controversy over the issue intensified when a New Delhi-based newspaper reported on its website that Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti had endorsed the Army action to save the lives of people. An official spokesman refuted the attribution.
“It is highly unfortunate, severely unethical and grossly irresponsible on part of such a prominent newspaper to attribute such sweeping remarks to the Chief Minister which she never made,” the spokesman said.
In a separate official statement, Mehbooba expressed concern and anguish over
the surfacing of these
videos reportedly from Budgam and has sought a detailed report from the police in this regard.
Terming the display of acts in the videos as unacceptable, the Chief Minister has asked the police to submit a detailed report about these incidents to her so that necessary action is initiated.
In another video, uniformed personnel are shown training guns on a group of stone-throwers and shooting dead one of them. Sources said the clip shot on a mobile phone is showing the first fatal casualties on the polling day in Chrar-e-Sharief area.