Indian authorities deployed thousands of police in Kashmir yesterday to prevent more demonstrations over the alleged rape and murder by security forces of two young Muslim women, witnesses said.
Police said they were probing the deaths of the 17-year-old woman and her 22-year-old sister-in-law, whose bodies were found in a shallow stream on Saturday.
Their families said the corpses bore marks of violence and their clothes were torn. They have accused security forces of abducting, raping and killing the women.
PHOTO: AFP
But the state government said that according to initial investigations the deaths appeared to have been caused by drowning and no foul play was involved.
A judicial probe has been ordered by Chief Minister Omar Abdullah, but it has failed to cool tempers.
Police and paramilitary forces shut down parts of the summer capital Srinagar and the women’s hometown of Shopian, where the deaths were reported, after separatists called for more protests and extended a strike call by two days.
The strike closed down shops, schools, banks and offices for the second day running in Srinagar and other towns in the Muslim-majority Kashmir valley.
Anti-India sentiment runs so deep in the valley, where there has been a two-decade insurgency against Indian rule, that even the suspicion of violence against locals, especially women, is enough to stir major demonstrations.
Since Saturday, more than 100 people have been wounded in clashes between police and angry protesters in Shopian and Srinagar.
Indian security forces have frequently been accused of committing human rights violations.
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