Army files counter FIR in Shopian firing
New Delhi, Jan 31 : The Indian Army has filed a counter FIR in the firing incident in Shopian district of Jammu and Kashmir, informed sources said on Wednesday.
The counter FIR was filed on January 28 in response to an FIR lodged by the Jammu and Kashmir Police over the killing of civilians that mentions soldiers from 10 Garhwal Rifles as the accused.
Three youths were killed in Ganowpora village of Shopian district in south Kashmir on January 27, when security forces opened fire after an army convoy came under a stone pelting attack.
Two youths, identified as Javaid Ahmad and Suhail Ahmad, died of bullet injuries the same day, while another, 19-year-old Rayees Ahmad Ganai, who was admitted in the hospital on Saturday, succumbed to his injuries on Wednesday morning.
In a statement, the Indian Army said the administrative convoy was passing through Ganaupura chowk when it came under “unprovoked and intense stone pelting” by a group of 100-120 people.
The army said the crowd surrounded an isolated portion of the convoy consisting of four vehicles. A Junior Commissioned Officer accompanying the convoy got hit on the head and fell unconscious suffering serious injury.
Considering the “extreme gravity of the situation, the army was constrained to open fire in self defence”, it said.
The state Bharatiya Janata Party has demanded withdrawal of the FIR, while Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti said the investigation into the killings of the civilians would be taken to its logical conclusion.
A magisterial probe has also been ordered by the state government into the firing incident.
IANS
