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Containing Militancy
13 rounded up for ‘rape, murder’ of minor
Protest against burning of woman
NC MLA dead
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Radio jockeys regale inmates
A schoolboy’s saga of grit Govt depots in remote areas face shortage of ration Of poor telecom service and indifferent authorities
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Police-Army operations to continue
Tribune News Service
Jammu, July 23 Khuda said the state police and the Army were working efficiently in coordination. "The police and the Army are coordinating in fighting insurgency across the state and this system will continue," the DGP said after his 'darbar' (meeting with police personnel of all ranks the Jammu division) at the Police Lines here. Joint operations of the Army and the police were intensified three years back, especially in the Poonch-Rajouri and Doda sectors with the help of the Special Operations Groups (SOGs) of the police. Earlier, addressing officers and lower ranks, Khuda said the militancy in J and K had "declined by 80 per cent". The rest of the insurgency was in the last stages now, he said, hoping to contain it with the cooperation of people. Khuda said he had also addressed a similar 'durbar' in Srinagar two days back, and thanked officers and jawans who fought militancy with courage. The DGP, however, cautioned the force to respect human rights during the anti-insurgency operations or while checking crime. He said the state police had earlier not been trained efficiently and there was no weaponry and no mobility during initial stages of militancy in the early ’90s but now the force had good mobility and good network to counter militancy across the state. To the issues raised the low rank personnel, the DGP said the police administration would now focus on improving working conditions of the cops, including the welfare aspects like accommodation, infrastructure at police stations and due compensation like jobs to the family members of the jawans killed in operations.
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13 rounded up for ‘rape, murder’ of minor
Srinagar, July 23 The police, legal experts said,would be hard put to defend the detention of people without hard evidence, such is people's anger that cops believe that it would send out signals that they were working hard on the case.The abduction of the 14-year-old girl, when she was on her way home from school with two friends on Friday, has sent shock waves across the valley. Many believe it to be the work of outsiders as locals could not "stoop so low" and commit the crime. When the cops first detained four persons, all outsiders making a living in Handawra, it only lent credence to their doubts. The four, SP Haseeb Mughal claimed, would often tease local girls.However, there is little evidence so far to charge them, but the police said they had not given anybody a clean chit yet. The accused, at least three in number, had slit the throat of Class VIII student after sexually assaulting her. The three girl students,the locals said,were accosted by the three men and, while two of them escaped, the victim fell into their trap.They kept quiet for some time and spoke up when the victim's family began searching for her. Meanwhile,tempers continue to run high on the fourth day of the incident with people holding demonstration at several places. |
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Protest against burning of woman
Udhampur, July 23 Adviser of the Women Study Centre, Jammu University and councillor of the Udhampur Municipal Committee, Parvesh Shah, in a press conference regretted that instead of taking action against the culprits, the police had been harassing the victim who was battling for life in the hospital. She alleged that Shammi’s husband sprinkled kerosene on her and set her on fire. Some neighbour rescued her, but she had received more than 75 per cent burns by that time. Instead of taking the victim to the hospital, her husband kept her locked in a room for seven days. When the parents of Shammi got information about the incident, they rescued her and took her to Udhampur. The women activists alleged that the poor parents repeatedly approached the police to take action against the culprits, but to no avail. This afternoon a deputation of women activists called on the SSP, Udhampur, and brought the matter to his notice. It was after the intervention of the SSP, a medico legal case was registered and the woman was sent to the district hospital, Udhampur, for treatment. Shammi’s parents alleged that her husband used to torture her. |
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NC MLA dead
Jammu, July 23 Chief Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad, speaker Tara Chand, NC leaders Farooq Abdullah and Omar Abdullah, PDP leaders Mufti Mohammed Sayeed and Mehbooba Mufti, expressed grief over his death. Jan, survived by wife, two sons and a daughter, will be buried at Poonch tomorrow.
— TNS
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Radio jockeys regale inmates
Jammu, July 23 Jagmeet
Bahri, J and K head of BIG 92.7 FM, said 100 Bal Niketan children participated in the
programme. — TNS |
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A schoolboy’s saga of grit Jammu, July 23 For Mohammad Iqbal it is seasonal occupation as the two-month-long pilgrimage will end in the next couple of days, but he hopes to earn enough to feed his family and continue with his studies. The decrease in the number of pilgrims is causing him anxiety and he fears his plans will go haywire in case the pilgrimage does not pick up. Besides his parents, he has to earn for his five sisters and two brothers. Iqbal is a student of class XI in the government school in the old city here and ferries pilgrims on his pony between Sheshnag and Ganesh Top on the mountainous route to the shrine in south Kashmir. The summer vacation in the school has come as Godsend to the young boy. He laments that because of the poor arrival of pilgrims and tough competition, the ponywallahs were left with no option but to charge less than the rates fixed by the government. Moreover, he has to spend a substantial sum feed the pony. He himself takes meals from ‘langars’ set up by various religious organisations. Iqbal said he had been doing this job for the past four years. Rafiq Mohammad, another ponywallah, regretted having brought his pony all the way to Chandanwari by pulling out of the Vaishno Devi shrine route in the hope of earning a good sum. He said against the fixed rate of Rs 350 for carrying a single pilgrim between Ganesh Top and Chandanwari, he had been charging Rs 200.He says he earned more than Rs 9,000 last year, but this time the savings might hardly touch Rs 3,500. |
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Govt depots in remote areas face shortage of ration Udhampur, July 23 Although a large chunk of population has been facing hardship due to unavailability of ration in government depots, the worst affected are the poor people.Even ration card holders of the below poverty line (BPL) category are not getting ration. Today a large number of villagers, led by BJP district president Pawan Gupta,demonstrated against the CAPD department and later submitted a memorandum to the deputy commissioner, Udhampur, to streamline the supply of ration in remote areas. According to the BJP leader, most of the ration depots functioning in Udhampur were sans stock and consumers had to return empty-handed every day. Furthermore, in some places the CAPD authorities had supplied wheat instead of atta. In some depots where ration was available, dealers were not giving the allotted ration to the consumers. The CAPD department has been facing difficulty to supply atta. The department had invited tenders for the grinding of PDS wheat and some flour millers challenged it in a court so that the department could not get the wheat ground in July .
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Of poor telecom service and indifferent authorities Kotranka (Rajouri), July 23 Residents of this area allege that landline facilities here are shoddy and communicating from here with the outside world remains a Herculean task for most part of the month. They said telecommunication authorities here were unresponsive and in a month the landline phones worked for only 10 days. “Most of the times the telephones don’t work here. The landline phones in our homes are just like showpieces, since the phone line remains dead for most part of the month”, said Anil Singh,a resident. “Even the telecommunication staff are hardly seen in the town and remain absent from duty. We on many occasions have asked the authorities to ensure telecommunication service in the area, but with little result”. Another resident Muhammad Shafi said since the telecommunication facilities were very poor in the area, they had to travel 10-15 km for making a phone call. “Since this is a militancy-affected area, telecommunication is most important for communication. Sometimes,there is an emergency situation and we don’t know what to do. We have to travel a long distance for making phone calls”, he said. “They (telecom authorities are charging monthly bills from us, but are not prepared to provide us quality service”. District telecommunication officer M.L.Raina admitted that there was some problem with the connectivity in Kotranka. “There are some technical problems with the connectivity there. We are rectifying those problems”, Raina said. “I assure the residents we will be providing them quality services very soon”.
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