Security forces battled violent demonstrators across Srinagar, parts of which came under curfew on Saturday as tensions ran high following the death of a 12-year-old boy.
Security forces battled violent demonstrators across Srinagar, parts of which came under curfew on Saturday as tensions ran high following the death of a 12-year-old boy.
Junaid Ahmed was critically injured on Friday evening after being hit by pellets at his home and died in a local hospital overnight, sparking widespread anger in Jammu and Kashmir’s summer capital and beyond.
Ninety-two people have been killed in as many days in clashes between security forces and protesters since militant commander Burhan Wani’s encounter killing on July 8.
Authorities said that Ahmed was hit when security forces fired shotgun pellets to quell a protest demonstration outside his home in Srinagar’s Sayeda Pora locality. But locals said he was not part of any protest, a claim corroborated by local leaders of ruling Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) who sought a probe and action against the security personnel involved in the incident. While enforcing curfew in Srinagar, security forces also fired teargas canisters at the funeral procession of Ahmed and at several places elsewhere in Srinagar as hundreds of people took to the streets in protest against the death, chanting pro-freedom and anti Indian slogans.
Ahmed’s funeral procession too was targeted with teargas shelling, witnesses said. Mourners marched from Ahmed’s home to a nearby ‘martyrs’ cemetery with his body for burial where security forces fired warning shots, pellets and tear gas to push them back.
Local PDP leader Dr Ali Mohammad Wani and party MLC Khursheed Aalam demanded a “time-bound impartial probe” into the incident and “stern action” against the guilty security personnel.
Opposition National Conference said Ahmed’s killing is “heartbreaking and horrific” and “exposes the ruthless response of the government towards a political sentiment it continues to ridicule ant stifle through mass repression”. Separatists also talked about “unabated brutality on peaceful protesters and even those sitting inside their homes and working in their fields.”
During the ongoing unrest which has spread to some other predominantly Muslims areas in Jammu, about 14,000 people have also been wounded. The unrest has thrown life completely out of gear in the Valley.
On Saturday, shops, banks, schools, colleges and many government offices remained closed and transport was off the roads as a shutdown, called by separatists and aided by official curfew and clampdowns, entered its 92nd day.
Sixty-one people were arrested during the past 24 hours for their alleged involvement in disturbing peace and disrupting “normal activity” in the Valley.
