A 26-year-old unemployed youth from Doda on Monday died during an Army recruitment rally organised in the hilly district as part of the special drive to fill 1,305 vacancies from J&K for three Territorial Army battalions. According to police, the youth identified as Yogeshwar Singh collapsed while participating in the rally and later died in the district hospital. Two civilians received injuries in cane charge while another policeman also sustained injuries during stone pelting in Talwara area of Reasi during another rally.
The special recruitment drive launched on Monday would continue till May 9 across six districts of the State, three each in Jammu & Kashmir divisions. Meanwhile, a similar rally in Talwara area of Reasi district witnessed chaos after some of the rejected candidates started stone pelting alleging ill-treatment at the hands of the local Army authorities.
Two civilians and one policeman were injured in the stone pelting and subsequent cane charge to disperse the unruly crowd. On the other hand, the special recruitment rallies organised at several other centres in Jammu & Kashmir region witnessed huge response from the youth brigade. According to the Defence spokesman, more than 5,000 aspirants had turned up at all the venues of the recruitment rally on day 1 of the screening process.