Javid Ahmad Lone, father of Suhail, who was among the 3 killed in Shopian. (Express photo: Shuaib Masoodi)
“Please spare us… let us be. We don’t want to say anything, we don’t need anything,” shouts an angry Javid Ahmad Lone, before relatives and neighbours placate him. Lone’s 16-year-old son Suhail Ahmad Lone was among the three civilians killed in Army firing on protesters at Ganawpora village in South Kashmir’s Shopian on January 27.
The J&K government’s decision to set up a probe and register a case of murder against the Army for the three deaths has strained relations between coalition partners Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the BJP. After the police registered an FIR against 10 Garwhal Rifles of the Army, the Army filed a “counter version”.
But for Lone, all this talk of an inquiry is a “farce”. “I am talking for one last time. We don’t want anything from the government, we don’t need any compensation, we don’t need any job, and we don’t need any probe. It is their court, their Army, their police and their administration. We don’t want the government to harass us in the name of a probe. We don’t want you (journalists) to disturb us. Just leave us alone.”
Asserting that they won’t take part in any investigation, Lone adds, “This has not happened for the first time. Every time they (the government) have promised investigation and justice. Has anything ever happened?” A week later, the entire Shopian district remains shut in protest, while the road to Ganawpora is blocked with boulders. Masked youth stop any vehicles coming down the path.
The family of Javid Ahmad Bhat, 19, of Ganawpora village says he was out fetching a gas cylinder when he was felled by Army bullets. They say Javid was a cricket buff and had returned just an hour earlier from a cricket field. “His routine was to play cricket till lunch. He returned at noon and asked mother for food,” his younger sister Waheeda says. “He then left home to get a gas cylinder. An hour later, we were told he has been killed.”
The third person to die, Rayees Ahmad Ganai, 23, belonged to Narpora village bordering Ganawpora. Injured in the firing, he succumbed to his injuries on January 31. Terming the Shopian deaths in Army firing as “unfortunate”, Chief Minister and PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti has promised that the probe would be taken to “its logical conclusion”, and said, “Justice and peace are the two sides of the same coin.”
PDP partner BJP, however, has thrown its weight behind the Army, saying “whatever it did, it did it in defence, to safeguard the country and as per the law”.
Contesting the FIR against the Army, BJP legislator Ravinder Raina said, “There is Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA) in Jammu and Kashmir; the Army has its own court. Lodge as many FIRs as you want, police FIRs don’t work.” The Army too says it fired in “self-defence”. Defence spokesperson Col Rajesh Kalia had said, “(The) Army administrative convoy came under intense stone-pelting by a group of 100-120. Within no time, the number swelled to 200-250 persons. The crowd surrounded an isolated portion of the convoy consisting of four vehicles. They caused extensive damage to these vehicles and tried to set them on fire.
A Junior Commissioned Officer (JCO) accompanying the convoy was hit on his head and fell unconscious. The mob tried to lynch the individual and snatch his weapon… Considering the extreme gravity of the situation, the Army was constrained to open fire in self-defence to prevent lynching of the JCO and burning of the vehicle by the mob.” Police say the Army’s version has been incorporated in the case file. “A day after the killing, the Army gave its version. Now it has been made part of the case and investigation is on,” Shopian Senior Superintendent of Police Shriram Ambarkar Dinkar told The Sunday Express.
The villagers of Ganawpora and adjacent areas contest the Army version. Abdul Rashid, a resident of Ganawpora says, “Armymen first came in the morning to remove a banner from the grave (of a militant who was killed two days ago). We didn’t allow them to do it. We had a verbal fight and they left. In the afternoon, they returned and started indiscriminate firing. They came with the intention to kill.” Standing next to a bullet-marked wall of his house, where his son was killed, Lone says,
“Let’s assume for a minute that stones were thrown at the Armymen. They should have fired warning shots in the air to disperse the people. Or at least, they could have fired at the legs. My son was shot in his neck; the other two boys were shot in the head. Is this what you call self-defence?”