Protesters pack pre-dawn funerals
THOUSANDS of Kashmiris defied the biting winter cold to attend the funerals last Friday (19) of two men killed during a security operation, heralding a widespread shutdown in the Indian-administered territory.
The pair – who police said had died in “crossfire” on November 15 in a gunfight with suspected separatists – had been hurriedly interred by authorities in a remote graveyard.
The deaths sparked anger in the restive region with their families insisting they had no links to the militants, accusing security forces of murdering them in “cold blood” and demanding their bodies be returned for a proper Islamic burial.
Officials last Thursday (18) ordered a probe into the killings of Mohammad Altaf Bhat and Mudasir Ahmed Gul before exhuming their remains and handing them over to relatives amid wails and emotional post-midnight scenes in Srinagar.
Thousands of people turned out for their pre-dawn reburials, with some angry mourners shouting “we want freedom!” and others reciting
Quranic verses, a photographer on the scene said.
“Your death has shattered us completely,” Bhat’s niece Saima Bhat posted on Twitter, adding she did not know “if we’ll be able to cope up from this tragedy!”
Family members said officers had instructed them to bury the men at night and not to allow crowds to assemble.
“There was just about enough time for our family and his children to have a last glimpse,” said one of Bhat’s relatives, declining to be identified.
Residents in large parts of the territory observed a shutdown later on Friday to protest the killings, in response to
a call by the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, a group of separatist parties seeking selfdetermination for Kashmir.
Shops shut across Srinagar and public transport did not circulate, with only a trickle of private cars on the roads.
Similar shutdowns took place in most main towns across the highly militarised disputed territory, which is also claimed by Pakistan.
Police and paramilitary troops in riot gear were deployed in force in the dead men’s neighbourhoods and at some “volatile points”.
Police in Kashmir have previously denied families access to the bodies of slain militant suspects.