Meer Irfan
Raining tears down her cheeks, Munaza, the 11-year-old daughter of Gulzar Ahmed Ganie, who is a resident of Chitragam Kalan in anticipation of her brother’s return had been waiting near the door of her house in this Shopian area in South Kashmir. Faisal Ahmed Ganie aged 14 left his home on Tuesday around 11 AM to play in the neighbourhood and did not return later, which got the family terrified. “His phone number was switched off, we tried to ring him several times,” his father told The Kashmiriyat.
A student of class 9th in a nearby school, Faisal Ahmed Ganie’s absence made his family ran from pillar to post to search for him, but they did not get a clue of his whereabouts until on Saturday evening when the phone rang. It was Faisal on the phone. In his sally voice over the phone, he said, “I have been cornered in the Satrajan orchards of Shopian by Army. I have two more Militants with me. I have been hit by a bullet,” one of his family members said adding, “We were soon rushed to the site of the encounter and asked to persuade him to surrender, but he did not listen to us.”
Late on Saturday, the Government forces took positions around orchards of the Satrajan area after contact was established with Militants. The 34 RR of Indian Army, Jammu Kashmir Police, and Central Reserve Police Force were fired upon when they launched a cordon and search operation in this Shopian area, triggering an encounter.
The Gunbattle continued around 7 AM on Sunday, residents told The Kashmiriyat.
The Inspector-General of Police, Kashmir range Vijay Kumar said that the Police tried its best to persuade him to surrender, however, he was not allowed by the other two Militants to surrender. The Police also claimed to have recovered one AK 56 and two pistols from the possession of the slain Militants. On Sunday morning around 7 AM, two Militants were killed, one out of three trapped was killed on Saturday evening.
Arms and ammunition including 01 AK-56 rifle, 2 pistols and other incriminating materials were recovered from the site of the encounter. All the recovered materials have been taken into case records for further investigation and to probe their complicity in other related crimes. The last rites of the killed militants shall be performed after conducting medico-legal formalities at Handwara and their nearest family members shall be allowed to participate in the last rites, the Police said in its statement.
The scenes at the house of Gulzar Ahmed Ganie are not uncommon to Kashmir or to the scores of people who have gathered here to express their solidarity with the family. The only sense of loss to a large crowd of sloganeering men outside the house, wailing women inside the house is that they have lost the “right to bury their dead.” The sense of anguish and dejection both is quite visible on the faces of the youth and the old.
Post the year 2016, Kashmir has witnessed a deadly cycle of violence in which hundreds of local youth have lost their lives. From mass funerals to stone-throwing clashes to thousands of people visiting the houses of slain youth to express their solidarity with the slain, Kashmir has witnessed a massive upsurge in violence since the year when Burhan Wani, a local militant commander was killed in an encounter on 08 July 2016 in Anantnag district.
Wait Of the Family Ends with his Blood-Soaked Body
The increasing participation of teenagers in militancy is the most harrowing sub-plot of the unfolding crisis in the Kashmir valley. The first case of a teenage Militant appeared in a 2017 encounter in which Faizan Bhatt, 15 years and 3 months old was shot dead by government forces, a couple of months after he joined Hizb ul Mujahideen. A resident of Mudasir Rashid Parray, 15, had picked up arms three months ago was killed in October 2018 in an encounter in Srinagar.
In January 2021, Police on Thursday said that they have arrested a 14-year-old militant from North Kashmir’s Bandipora district. Addressing a press conference, police said the boy had gone missing 15 days ago from his home. He has been identified as Imtiyaz Ahmad, a resident of Panzigam, Bandipora.
Folding her hands to the camera, while speaking to The Kashmiriyat, the mother of the teenage boy Faisal on Saturday pleaded that he be allowed to return home. “I do not have any other boys in the house to look at, he is the lonely brother among four sisters,” his mother informed. “Bhayav Waleh Gharih Wapis, Yeti Chun Kiheen, (Brother come back home, the home is empty in your absence),” Munazah his youngest sister said on Friday afternoon when they issued a video asking Faisal to return home. Munazah perhaps looked most distressed in the house and during my stay of more than two hours, the flow of her tears did not stop.
Faisal, a student of a popular private school in Tehsil headquarters of Zainapora named, National Innovations Public School had recently passed Class 9th examinations. “He was very regular to the school, left home early morning and came back at around 3:30, he never missed a day at the school till the administration ordered the closure of the schools yet again in view of rising covid cases in the valley,” one of his family member said, adding, “he would rarely go out to play cricket with his friends.”
Gulzar Ahmad, his father who is an apple orchardist also made a ferverent appeal to his son asking him to return home.
Various families have issued videos after their children have gone missing in Kashmir valley as the Kashmir valley witnesses heightened recruitment of locals into Militant groups.
Though the security agencies in Kashmir have adopted various stiff measures to ensure the downfall of the graph of Militant recruitment, there has not been a considerable drop in the numbers. The security forces maintain that radicalization from across the border is the main push behind Kashmir’s young to join Militant ranks. There definitely have been incidents wherein the links have been established, however, for many like Ghulam Hassan Ganie, the reasons range from widespread disillusionment to the policies that have been in place for many decades.
To Faisal’s grandfather, Ghulam Hassan Ganie the development has come as a shock, “We issued an appeal two days ago asking people to help us find Faisal, and when we were still looking out from him, he has disappeared forever. I do not know why kids of Kashmir have to die at such a young age?” Ghulam Hassan asking. Mr. Hassan is agitated though at the new Policy of Government Forces to bury the bodies of slain Militants way from their natives. “They are our boys, we deserve to kiss their heads, see them once before they are buried, we deserve to have their dead bodies and bury them in front of our eyes, so that we can offer Fateh to them, visit their Graves,” he said.
“Do you think that things have gone bad? No! things are the worst now in Kashmir. Imagine a 14-year-old picking up gun and then being shot dead. This is the worst state of affairs. Either Kashmir stands heavily polarized or what is being shown in merely an eyewash,” Adil Hassan Dar, a student of Kashmir University, who is the neighbour of Faisal said. “Nobody had a distant inkling that Faisal would join militancy because of his age. His shoulders were too young to carry a gun,” he said.