Kashmir is witnessing a manifold increase in protests and violence, with as many as 43 people, including 27 militants and two police officers, killed in the month of June. Around a dozen civilians got killed as they gathered at encounter sites to save the militants under siege. Fears are rising that post Monday’s Eid, Kashmir will witness another spell of unrest.
It was perhaps for the first time after 1947 that prayers were not held at Srinagar’s Jamia Masjid on the last Friday of Ramzan. However, the previous night’s violence forced the government to impose a curfew around Jamia Masjid and in other downtown localities. The night before, a DSP of J&K police, Mohammed Ayub Pandith, who was in civilian clothes, was lynched by a slogan-shouting mob which suspected him to be an “IB and RAW agent”, as he was shooting a video. He tried to save himself by opening fire, but was lynched by the mob. This barbaric act made Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti warn the people not to test the patience of the police and the security forces. Earlier on Thursday, three Lashkar-e-Tayyaba militants were killed in Kakapora village of Pulwama in South Kashmir in a fierce gun battle.
With the separatists adding fuel to the fire, speculation is rife that post Eid-ul-Fitr, the conflagration will only get bigger.