KASHMIR LOCKDOWN 500 protests, many injured

At least 500 incidents of protest have broken out in Indian Kashmir since New Delhi stripped the region of its autonomy and imposed a military clampdown more than three weeks ago, a senior government source said Wednesday.

The Himalayan valley is under a strict lockdown, imposed hours before India’s decision to bring Kashmir under its direct rule. Movement is restricted and phone and internet services have been cut.

The lockdown, as well as the deployment of tens of thousands of extra troops to reinforce the 500,000 based in Kashmir, was ordered amid fears of unrest in a region where an armed rebellion against Indian rule has been waged since 1989.

But protests have broken out, including in the main city of Srinagar, with police using pellet guns and tear gas to disperse the crowds.

A senior government source said at least 500 protests and incidents of stone throwing have occurred since August 5, with more than half taking place in Srinagar.

Nearly 100 civilians have been injured so far, with a further 300 police and more than 100 paramilitary troopers hurt, the official added.

‘The number of protests could be much higher and bigger without the blockade in force,’ the official said, adding that ‘anger and public defiance is constantly rising’.

‘Efforts for easing the conditions are made all the time but nothing seems to be working for now. There is nervousness spreading in the security establishment.’

He added that the communications blackout meant even security forces were struggling to obtain information about rural areas.

Meanwhile, residents are refusing to resume their normal lives in an act of defiance, an AFP reporter in Srinagar said.

While authorities have re-opened schools, students have stayed away. Told to keep open all day or ‘don’t open at all’, some shops have remained shut.

At least 4,000 people have been detained across the valley, security and government sources said last week, including businessmen, academics, activists and local politicians, with a few released since then.

A separate senior government official said Wednesday that at least 1,350 protesters — described by police as ‘stone-pelters’ — have been arrested since August 5.

The detentions came as the Supreme Court on Wednesday gave the government one week to respond to a legal challenge calling for the communications blackout to be ended to allow for media reporting.

The court also said several petitions challenging the removal of the constitutional clause on Kashmir’s autonomy would be heard in October.

More than a dozen petitions have been filed in the Supreme Court questioning the legality the action, which the government said was aimed at developing the region at the heart of animosity with Pakistan for decades, reports Reuters.

On Wednesday, a panel of judges headed by chief justice Ranjan Gogoi, said the court would hear the petitions starting in the first week of October.

‘How the court decides these cases will have a deep bearing on the destiny of democracy in India,’ Suhrith Parthasarathy, a Chennai-based lawyer, said in an article for the Hindu newspaper.

The court also ordered the federal government to submit a response within seven days to a plea by Anuradha Bhasin, the editor of the daily Kashmir Times, who has sought a relaxation of a government ban on telephone and internet services in Kashmir since August 5.

Some landline telephone connections that were restored last week. The government has said the restrictions were necessary to maintain law and order, but residents have expressed frustration and anger over the lockdown.

Hundreds of people have been queued up outside a government office in Kashmir’s main city of Srinagar every day to make calls outside the region.

The Supreme Court also allowed Sitaram Yechury, head of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), to visit Kashmir to meet his colleague, Mohammed Yousuf Tarigami, a former lawmaker who is among hundreds of political workers and activists that the government has detained since the crackdown began.

Yechury was turned back from Srinagar airport when he tried to visit his colleague on August 9.

Separatist militants have been battling Indian security forces in Kashmir for years. India accused Pakistan of stoking the insurgency. Pakistan denies doing so.

The nuclear-armed rivals both rule parts of the divided Himalayan region but claim it in full.

The revocation of Kashmir’s special status in the constitution means people there will lose exclusive rights to property, government jobs and colleges places and open them up to all Indians.

Prime Minister Namenda Mode says the reform will open up Kashmir’s economy to the benefit of all.

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net