Kulgam Encounter in South Kashmir Leaves 10 Dead, Over 40 Injured

Kulgam Encounter – Latest Updates / News: In the Kulgam encounter in the South Kashmir, ten people including seven civilians and three militants were killed and over 40 people were injured. The civilians were killed due to the explosion at the Kulgam encounter site. 

Reports said that locals residents in a bid to douse the fire from the affected house swamped the encounter site. They said people were sprinkling water on the burning house when a massive explosion occurred leaving scores injured.

Kulgam Encounter, South Kashmir

The critically injured people in the Kulgam encounter were first rushed to the district hospital where doctors declared three of them brought dead. Five seriously injured civilians were shifted to the SMHS hospital in Srinagar where two more people succumbed to their injuries. Five other injured were shifted to the district hospital in Anantnag where three people with bullet injuries were retained for treatment while the rest were transferred to Srinagar.

In a statement, a police spokesman said, “Civilians visited the encounter site immediately after the operation in spite of the appeal not to visit as thorough search is to be made for explosives once flames douse off. “They didn’t listen and visited the spot immediately after the force withdrew and some explosives went off resulting in injuries to the civilians,” he said.

Mirwaiz Umar Farooq in a statement said, ”We strongly condemned and protest the mayhem unleashed in Kulgam by the ruthless Indian state in which so far five civilians and three armed youth were killed besides injuries to scores.”

Mirwaiz said the Joint Resistance Leadership, which apart from him includes Ali Shah Geelani and Yasin Malik, has called for a complete shutdown on Monday and a sit-in protest on Tuesday at Lal Chowk.

The governor’s administration said it was anguished over civilian killings in Kulgam and announced an ex gratia of Rs one lakh to the next of kin of the deceased. Director General of Police Dilbag Singh expressed condolences to the bereaved families.

Comments from Omar Abdullah and Mehbooba Mufti

Terrible news coming out from Kulgam.May the deceased find a place in Jannat. Alienating the people in the fight against militancy is a sure-fire recipe for losing the fight. How long can we go on ignoring the ground realities & living in denial about how bad things are in Kashmir?

Extremely saddened by the news of kulgam incident, where civilians were once again caught in the cross fire of violence, thus adding fuel to the already volatile situation. All words of condemnation, condolence sound very hollow at this tragedy.

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