BJP contradicts J&K CM Mehbooba Mufti

The BJP on Saturday contradicted chief minister Mehbooba Mufti that the security forces did not know that Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Muzaffar Wani was among the three militants hiding in a private house at Kokernag in southern Anantnag beforehand and that had they known about it they may have given him “a second chance” in the July 8 encounter in which the trio was killed.

Terming Wani’s killing a “success”, Jammu and Kashmir BJP chief Sat Sharma said the identity of the terrorist “doesn’t matter” in such operations. “As far as the question of the event (killing of Wani) is concerned, definitely the security forces had the knowledge. They knew who was inside,” he said.

Meanwhile, clashes amid curfews and shutdowns continued in the Kashmir Valley on Saturday, leaving about a dozen people injured. Among them were three residents, including a woman shot at by security forces during a protest at Imam Sahib in southern Shopian, police and hospital sources said.

Protests and clashes were also reported from Janglat Mandi in Anantnag town and Rawalpora in Srinagar. Some other parts of the Valley also witnessed small rallies and processions in the evening but their intensity compared to Friday was “very low”, the official sources said.

Officials said that barring parts of summer capital Srinagar, Anantnag and the highway town of Pampore, curfew was lifted from the Valley at dawn on Saturday. However, the separatists-called shutdown continued to bring the normal life to a standstill. The call for shutdown and protests has been extended by an alliance of key separatist leaders till August 5.

Late Friday evening, unidentified gunmen shot dead a 45-year-old bookstore owner Fayaz Ahmed Rather at Saidpora, Rafiabad outside the north-western town of Sopore, police said. He was an activist of the faction of separatist Hurriyat Conference alliance headed by Syed Ali Shah Geelani.

Meanwhile, pro-independence Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) leader, Muhammad Yasin Malik, who is part of a recently formed ‘issue-based’ loose alliance of key separatist leaders, has been shifted to Central Jail Srinagar after remaining in police custody at the City’s Kothibagh police station since July 9. The other members of the alliance Mr. Geelani and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq continue to be under house arrest.

In a related development, Kashmir bar council on Saturday filed a Public Interest Litigation in the J&K High Court seeking ban on the use of pellet guns during crowd control effort by security forces. The pellet gun has been at the centre of a major controversy and strong voices seeking a blanket ban on its use have been raised both at home and abroad after more than 200 youth and minor boys and girls were maimed and blinded by it. The petition has been sent to the Chief Justice of High Court for his decision whether the petition will be treated as PIL. “Since these pellets guns have caused grave injuries to youth and children we decided to file a PIL,” said Kashmir High Court Bar Association president, Mian Abdul Qayoom.

Separately the separatist’ alliance has asked the people to be wary of news channels Times Now, News X and Zee News, accusing these of working on an agenda. “These channels are aggressive and bigoted, by design, in their reportage of Kashmir in order to mislead and poison the Indian public opinion regarding the events in Kashmir and the Kashmir issue,” it said in a statement here. It asked the Kashmiris to avoid watching these channels and boycott speaking to their correspondents or being part of their panel discussions. “Also, people have been asked to be very vigilant during the current resistance as agencies working to subvert and malign the agitation are quiet active. In certain areas posters have come up in which imams, some religious organisations and some prominent citizens of those areas are being targeted and threatened. People have been asked to be cautious of such ploys and not let them succeed in dividing people along sectarian lines,” the statement issued on behalf of Mr. Geelani, the Mirwaiz and Mr. Malik said.

In another statement, the separatists said that the shutdown initially called to mourn the killing of Wani would continue till August 5 with daily relaxation after 6 pm. They also announced to march on Srinagar’s Hazratbal shrine on Friday to offer prayers and hold a rally to “pay homage to the martyrs”.