Fresh state terrorism: three youth martyred in Kulgam attack

SRINAGAR: In Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK), Indian troops in their fresh act of state terrorism martyred three youth in Kulgam district here on Sunday, Indian media reported.

The youth were killed during a cordon and search operation launched by Indian army, paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force and Special Operation Group of police in Tarigam area of the district.

The killing of the youth by the Indian forces has triggered massive anti-India protests in Tarigam and other parts of the district.

Hundreds of youth assembled near the cordon and search operation site in Turigam and shouted pro-freedom and anti-India slogans.

As rumours circulated about India’s deployment of 10,000 more troops in occupied Kashmir in the wake of rising tensions after the Pulwama attack, Indian-occupied Kashmir Governor Satya Pal Malik called for calm, saying the movement of troops was part of a poll exercise, Indian media reported.

The movement of troops caused alarm among locals, who began stockpiling rations and medicines as authorities remained mum about the increased deployment in the occupied territory.

Former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Mehbooba Mufti on Sunday tweeted about “the sense of unease and panic in Kashmir” as well. “Nobody has a clue about what is to come but an ominous feeling of impending doom hangs in the air,” she said.

Governor Malik late on Saturday dismissed apprehensions of war, saying that in occupied Kashmir, “rumours become news”.

“There is no need to panic. A six-member team of election commission of India is coming to [occupied] Kashmir and we need to discuss these security parameters with them and we want to hold timely elections and want to show the team that we are capable of holding elections on time,” Malik said, as quoted by the Hindustan Times.

Mehbooba Mufti also noted that “public anger has been diverted towards Kashmiris” in the wake of the Pulwama attack, in a reference to the intensifying harassment and discrimination of Kashmiris across India.

More than 700 Kashmiri students, workers and traders have returned to occupied Kashmir from the rest of India to escape reprisals for the attack, which has also ratcheted up regional tensions after India alleged that those who planned the attacks had links with Pakistan — a charge that Islamabad has vigorously denied.

“They have never been subjected to this kind of unbridled hostility,” Mufti continued. “You want Kashmir, yet wage a war against its people? What are they being punished for? Why brutalise them?” she asked.

On Saturday, police arrested at least 200 Jamaat-e-Islami activists ahead of a hearing on Article 35-A in the Indian Supreme Court on Monday. Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front Chairman Yasin Malik was also among those taken into custody.

The JI in a statement termed the crackdown a “well-designed conspiracy to further add to the already deteriorated situation in occupied Kashmir”, raising questions over the timing of the arrest “when petitions challenging Article 35-A were listed in the Indian Supreme Court”.

 

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