The government on Friday extended by a week time to the magistrate to complete probe into the killing of three civilians teenagers in army firing in Shopian district of south Kashmir last month. The government had appointed deputy commissioner Shopian as inquiry officer and asked him to complete the probe in the 20-day time period from January 27 when the army firing at Ganowpora killed three civilians.
While two of them died on the spot, another youth succumbed to injuries at SKIMS Soura after few days. “The inquiry officer (deputy commissioner Shopian) has sought one more to complete the probe which was granted to him,” Divisional Commissioner Baseer Khan told news agency GNS over phone when asked about the outcome of the probe as twenty days time, expired on Friday. On January 29, Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti stood firm on the investigation into the killings of civilians in Army firing and said: “The probe ordered into the killing of civilians will be taken to its logical conclusion. Such killings only impair and slow down the political process here.
]An FIR was lodged against the guilty and the office of the Deputy Commissioner, Shopian, will come up with its report,” Mufti told the Assembly during the budget session which came to close earlier this week. “The Army as an institution has done a great job, but the grace of an institution only enhances once the black sheep within are identified and weeded out,” she had said. The ruling PDP’s stand on the issue is contrary to that of the BJP, which criticized the police for lodging the FIR against the Army. R.S. Pathania, a BJP MLA, again demanded the withdrawal of the FIR against the Army. Even BJP’s National General Secretary Ram Madhav, who was a key player in cobbling of the coalition with PDP, openly said that FIR should not have been registered against the army.
The Supreme Court of India on Monday directed police not to take coercive measures against Major Adiya who has been named in the FIR filed by the Jammu and Kashmir Police in Police Station Shopian.