Peace Goes Downhill

The killing of three special police officers is set to worsen the conflict in Kashmir

- Tariq Bhat

THE CONFLICT BETWEEN the police and militants in Kashmir has touched a new low. On September 19, three special police officers were abducted from two neighbouring villages in Shopian, and were shot dead barely a kilometre away from their homes.

Militants had earlier abducted 12 people who had relatives in the police. They were released only after they appeared in video messages to S.P. Vaid, the director-general of police in Kashmir. In one such video, Zubair Ahmed, a PhD student whose two brothers are policemen, says, “I want to tell Vaid: Please do not vandalise the homes of militants. They can do the same to us. Today, they are pardoning us; but, next time, they will not.” A militant is then heard asking Ahmed whether he was beaten or coerced into recording the clip. “No, I was not,” he replies. The militant then tells him that it is the first and the last warning to the police. “We hold no prisoners because we have no jails. We shoot!” he warns.

The militants seem to have made good on their threat. The slain policemen—Nisar Ahmed Dhobi, 38, of Kapran; and Fidous Ahmed, 28, and Kulwant Singh, 35, of Buttagund— were abducted from their homes at around 6am. Villagers say the militants first entered Dhobi’s house. “He was performing ablution in the washroom when they asked for him,” Abdul Rashid, Dhobi’s father, told THE WEEK. “He came out and they took him.”