14yearold girl set ablaze by man succumbs to burns
A teenage girl, who suffered 70% burns after she was set ablaze by a 23-year-old man for rejecting his marriage proposal, died here on Tuesday after battling for life for over a week, police said. The 14-year-old was undergoing treatment at the Government Rajaji Hospital. The girl, studying in the ninth standard, was set ablaze when she was returning home on February 16. Police arrested Balamurugan, who had been reportedly pestering her to marry him. The girl’s parents had lodged a complaint against him with police.
Jammu and Kashmir police on Tuesday said that although there is no evidence of the presence of the terror outfit Islamic State (IS) in Kashmir, its claim that it killed a policeman in Srinagar on Sunday has to be investigated.
“The claim (of the killing of the policeman) is on their (Islamic State’s) website. There is no perceivable presence of the Islamic State on the ground in Kashmir but it (the claim) needs to be investigated further,” director general of state police SP Vaid said over phone.
“It could be possible that an individual militant, influenced by the Islamic State, carried out the attack. We are investigating it. But there is no evidence to suggest any presence of the outfit in the Valley,” Vaid added.
Reportedly, the IS has said through its news platform, Amaq News Agency, that it has successfully carried out the killing of Farooq Ahmed Yatoo in Soura locality on Sunday night. Yatoo, a native of Chadoora area of Budgam district, was posted as a guard at the residence of separatist leader Fazal Haq Qureshi.
The Centre, too, sought to downplay the issue of Islamic State’s presence in Jammu and Kashmir, saying it has no existence in the Valley.
“There is no physical infrastructure or manpower of the IS in the Valley. It does not exist in the Valley,” a home ministry spokesperson said in New Delhi.
This is the second time in the last three months that the IS has claimed, through its official mouthpiece, of having carried out an attack in Kashmir. The outfit had claimed an attack in Zakura on the outskirts of Srinagar in November last year. A policeman and a militant were killed in the attack.
The DGP has said in the past, too, that the IS has “no footprint in Kashmir” as has the Union home ministry. After the IS’s claim in November, Rajya Sabha
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Pakistan army on Tuesday violated the ceasefire and resorted to shelling on forward posts and civilian areas along the Line of Control (LoC) in Poonch and Rajouri districts of Jammu and Kashmir, leaving two BSF jawans injured.
The Indian army was retaliating strongly and effectively, a defence spokesperson said.
The schools in the affected areas in Rajouri district were closed as a precautionary measure, deputy commissioner (DC), Rajouri, Shahid Iqbal Choudhary said.
Ceasefire violations have left 21, including 12 security personnel, dead and more than 80 others, mostly civilians, injured this year, police said. PTI
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was told in January that “nothing has been established on ground that the ISIS is operating in any part of Kashmir valley”.
Minister of state for home Hansraj Ahir, in his reply, however, had mentioned militant commander Zakir Musa’s organisation, Ansar Gazwat-Ul-Hind (AGUH), which said to be a branch of the Al-Qaeda in Kashmir and formed in July last year.
“(It) has posted adverse materials on social media. There are reports that at present, Zakir Musa has support of less than 10 militants,” Ahir had said.
Even Kashmir’s separatist leaders, including Syed Ali Shah Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik, had said last year that the “ongoing freedom struggle” in the state is “indigenous” and has “nothing to do with” global terrorist groups such as the IS or Al-Qaeda.