Posters threaten Pandits in Pulwama to leave

Majid Jahangir

Tribune News Service

Srinagar, August 6

Mysterious posters, attributed to the Lashkar-e-Islam, have appeared in Pulwama district of south Kashmir, asking the Kashmiri Pandits living in the transit camps there to leave the Valley.

The posters have also threatened them of targeted killings if they did not leave.

The police are investigating the authenticity of the posters and suspect the posters to be a “handiwork of miscreants”.

A few unsigned posters of the Lashkar-e-Islam —- which was in the news last year for attacks on the telecom sector —- were found pasted around the migrant Pandit colony at Haal in Pulwama.

“We have begun investigation, but it looks the handiwork of miscreants,” said Superintendent of Police (SP), Pulwama, Rayees Mohammad Bhat. “The group to which the poster has been attributed existed in north Kashmir and has no base here,” the SP added.

“All migrants/RSS agents leave or face death. No space for Kashmir Pandits who want another Israel in Kashmir to kill Kashmiri Muslims. Double/triple your security, be ready for target killing. You will die,” read an unsigned poster of the outfit.

The Pulwama SP said four posters were found around the Haal migrant camp. Nearly 70 migrant families living at Government Migrant Colony, Haal, have already shifted to Jammu following massive protests over the killing of Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani on July 8. The Pandits had migrated following an incident of stone-throwing in the area. However, the police later claimed that the target of the stone-throwing near the Haal minority camp was a CRPF picket manning the enclave.

Meanwhile, Deputy Commissioner, Pulwama, Munir-ul-Islam said the posters did not look authentic.

The Lashkar-e-Islam, a breakaway faction of the Hizbul Mujahideen, was last year blamed by the police for a series of mysterious civilian killings in and around Sopore. Those killed by the outfit had some ties to militant outfits or separatist hardliners.

While the police blamed militants for the killings, the victim families had accused Indian security agencies for the deaths.

A leader of the hardline faction of the Hurriyat Conference said: “We have a clear stand on the Kashmiri Pandits and no one can threaten them as they are our brothers. The poster is the handiwork of Indian agencies to defame the present movement that has unnerved India.”