SRINAGAR: A day after three people were killed in firing by security forces, the situation in Kashmir remained tense on Saturday. Authorities imposed a strict curfew in parts of the Valley including Beerwah and Chadoora in Central Kashmir and Sopore in North Kashmir where the deaths occurred.
Hundreds of police and CRPF men enforced the restrictions in those areas. The police had placed barricades on the roads and did not allow any public movement.
In the areas where there was no curfew, restrictions were enforced to prevent the assembly of more than four persons, police said.
Despite the curfew and restrictions, people took out protest marches in many places and clashed with security personnel.
Protests erupted in Wagoora area of Sopore in North Kashmir after a youth killed in security forces firing on Friday was laid to rest in a local graveyard. The youth torched an abandoned police post in Wagoora and pelted stones at the police and CRPF men. The police personnel fired tear gas shells and resorted to baton charge to disperse the protestors.
The police fired pellets and tear gas shells to foil a protest march in South Kashmir’s Anantnag district injuring 40 people, including seven women. The injured were shifted to different hospitals. Chanting pro-freedom and anti-India slogans, protestors in Pattan, North Kashmir demanded an end to civilian killings.
At least 57 people including two policemen have been killed in the ongoing violence triggered by the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani on July 8.
Meanwhile, at least 45 Kashmiri writers, poets and intellectuals, including Jnanpith awardee Rehman Rahi, condemned the killings and called for an end to the bloodshed. They said an “unprecedented repression” by the security forces had led to further alienation of Kashmiris.
“There is an urgent need to find a political solution to the Kashmir issue before it is too late,” the group of writers said adding security forces should be barred from using excessive force on protestors and refrain from shedding more human blood. They also called for a ban on the use of pellet guns.