A chit from a stranger turned their world upside down

We were under the impression that one day he will turn up as a successful man and will come home to tell us look I did something in life. ELYAS AHMAD BHAT, elder brother of Mudasir Ahmad Bhat

SRINAGAR:A piece of paper from a stranger shattered the calm of Bhat family last Friday. The chit claimed that their 32-yearold son, who had been missing since January 2017, has been killed in an encounter with security forces in the forests of north Kashmir.

Since then the Srinagar family has been going from pillar to post and protesting to seek the whereabouts of their son, Mudasir Ahmad Bhat, who had left his home in January last year to find work in Saudi Arabia.

“A youth, who was wearing a helmet, dropped a piece of paper at our home on Friday evening saying Mudasir Ahmad Bhat has been killed. The chit said his code name was Abu Abdullah. The message turned our world upside down,” said Elyas Ahmad Bhat, Mudasir’s elder brother.

On Saturday, a police spokesman had said an unidentified militant was killed a day earlier (Friday) by a joint patrol of security forces in an encounter in the forests of Kachama in Kupwara. The news of unidentified militant’s death was widely covered in the media. The man was buried at Kachama graveyard.

The anonymous paper chit and the rumors on social media triggered protests and stone pelting in uptown Barzulla where the Bhat family lives. The family also protested in press enclave demanding the exhumation of the body.

“My father and other elders have gone to Kupwara today (Monday) where they were shown a picture by officials and they have identified that it was indeed my younger brother,” Elyas said.

The family has approached district administrative and police authorities for exhumation and DNA test of the slain man.

Senior superintendent of police, Kupwara, Ambarkar Shriram Dinkar told HT that the family has approached for the identification of the deceased who was killed in an encounter on June 29. “We had already filed an FIR. We showed them a photo and will be following the legal procedure and they will have to give consent for DNA testing,” he said, adding: “It needs judicial consent for exhumation”.

The family is flabbergasted over the claims of police that he was a militant. They say Mudasir left home in January 2017 along with his educational certificates to find work in Saudi Arabia.

“He had some argument with the father as happens in every family and left home. He told me that he is going to Saudi and is even ready to ride camels there if he won’t find any other job. Why would he take his certificates along if he wanted to become a militant,” Elyas said.

Mudasir had not remained in touch with his family since then and they had to file a missing report with police on January 20, 2017. A graduate in arts and youngest of five siblings, Mudasir was a good electrician and would run a grocery shop near his home, his family said.

“We were under the impression that one day he will turn up as a successful man and will come home to tell us look I did something in life,” Elyas said, adding, “But , instead the news of his death has knocked our door”.