In a mil­i­tary op­er­a­tion be­tween In­dian army and Kash­miri in­sur­gents, three Kash­mir fight­ers, one In­dian army sol­dier were killed in Pul­wama, Kash­mir to­day morn­ing. 7 protest­ing civil­ians were killed and 15 oth­ers in­jured and hos­pi­talised.

The In­dian army killed the per­sons they had planned to. One has been named as sol­dier-turned-in­sur­gent Za­hoor Ah­mad Thokar. The iden­ti­ties of the other two have been not been dis­closed, but they have been dubbed as t……….ts. One In­dian sol­dier was also killed and two in­jured, but their names are not in pub­lic do­main.

Brav­ing the icy cold arc­tic con­di­tions, the res­i­dents of Sirnoor vil­lage in Pul­wama dis­trict of South Kash­mir could not stay in­doors when they heard gun­shots around their neigh­bour­hood. When it dawned on them that res­i­dents of the area had been killed in an “en­counter” by the In­dian armed forces, they forced their way into the area and protested.

When the army came across many in­no­cent civil­ians who protested against them in the area, the army opened fire. The In­dian army killed 7 civil­ians and in­jured nearly dou­ble the num­ber with se­vere bul­let wounds. It was of­fi­cially la­belled as a cor­don and search op­er­a­tion, one of many that are car­ried out to hunt for in­sur­gents who re­sist the In­dian army as they fight a bat­tle for free­dom of Kash­mir. 

The Gov­er­nor of Jammu and Kash­mir Satya Pal Ma­lik has not made any of­fi­cial state­ment though there is an in­nocu­ous re­gret note by the J & K po­lice. Par­lia­men­tary po­lit­i­cal par­ties and rep­re­sen­ta­tives of rev­o­lu­tion­ary po­lit­i­cal groups have con­demned the killings of in­no­cents. 

A three day statewide mourn­ing has been called by the Joint Re­sis­tance Lead­er­ship and the An­ju­man-e-Is­lamia Bhadar­wah (AIB) has called for a com­plete shut­down in the Chenab val­ley. 

AIB pres­i­dent Per­vaiz Ahmed Sheikh termed the killings as “most heinous and open­ing up of a bloody war against un­armed civil­ians” in Kash­mir. In a tweet, Mir­waiz Umar Fa­rooq said, “Bul­lets and pel­lets rain! As Govt of In­dia has de­cided to kill Kash­miris…..JRL and peo­ple will march to­wards Badami Bagh Army can­ton­ment on Mon­day 17 Dec to ask GOI to kill all of us at one time rather than killing us daily.” 

Na­tional Con­fer­ence leader Omar Ab­dul­lah in a tweet said, “What a sad day, 11 peo­ple killed in Kash­mir.” PDP Pres­i­dent Mehbooba Mufti said, “no coun­try can win a war killing its own peo­ple.”

In a state­ment is­sued in Chandi­garh, Sikh or­gan­i­sa­tion Dal Khalsa strongly con­demned the use of deadly force against peace­ful pro­tes­tors and said that In­dian se­cu­rity forces are treat­ing Kash­miris as en­e­mies. “We ex­press deep con­do­lences with fam­i­lies of vic­tims of state atroc­i­ties and ex­tend our sol­i­dar­ity to the re­sis­tance move­ment lead­er­ship.” said party pres­i­dent Harpal Singh Cheema.

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The party state­ment paid trib­utes to the civil­ians who fell prey to the bul­lets of the se­cu­rity forces and said that “the brave peo­ple of Kash­mir are keep­ing the as­pi­ra­tions of free­dom afloat with their blood and un­flinch­ing com­mit­ment.”