Valley shuts down amid funerals

No one dared to tell Ali Muhammad Sheikh, 51, all night, that his son and the only breadwinner in the family, Asif Sheikh, was shot dead along with his two friends in Baramulla on Monday evening.

As Mr. Sheikh gropes in the dark to know the reason for the killings, his son is now part of the casualty figures of one of the bloodiest months in Kashmir this year.

High casualty numbers

In a throwback to the 1990s, when militancy peaked in Kashmir, 51 people — 20 militants, 18 civilians and 13 security personnel — were killed in April in Kashmir, especially in the southern districts.

In comparison, a total of 36 — 15 jawans, 17 militants and four civilians — were killed in the first three months of the year.

As slain militants, Sameer Ahmad Bhat alias Tiger and Aqib Khan, were offered multiple funerals by tens of thousand of local people and a complete shutdown was held across the Valley on Tuesday, the trio of civilians killed in Baramulla were buried quietly, as no local person was ready to come forward and name those behind the killings.

The police blamed a group of Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), led by a local militant, for the killings.

The separatist form Joint Resistance Leadership (JRL), comprising Syed Ali Geelani, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Yasin Malik, said, “It is a matter of serious concern and needs to be investigated. We appeal to the UN to take note of this and set up an impartial inquiry into these killings.”

“It’s a difficult year,” a senior counter-insurgency cell official said on the condition of anonymity.