Hundreds of angry demonstrators clashed with government forces Wednesday in Indian-occupied Kashmir after soldiers martyred a young man at a checkpoint, officials and locals said.
The man's martyrdom came amid heightened tensions in the restive Muslim-majority Himalayan region after New Delhi scrapped its semi-autonomous status and imposed a curfew to quell unrest.
Mehrajuddin Peer Shah, 25, was driving his car when paramilitary soldiers shot him near a checkpoint in the outskirts of occupied Srinagar.
Police said Shah ignored signals to stop at two checkpoints "in suspicious conditions" before troops fired at the vehicle.
Shah was taken to hospital but died from his injuries, police added in a statement.
But Shah's father, Ghulam Nabi, refuted the police's claims and said his son was shot and martyred in cold blood.
"Had soldiers fired at his vehicle while fleeing any checkpoint, his car would have got bullet marks," he told reporters in occupied Srinagar.
Witnesses told AFP the young man had come out of his car to answer questions from soldiers at the checkpoint, before he was shot as he got back into the vehicle.
Comments
Comments are closed.