Stone-pelters cock a snook at Army chief

SRINAGAR: Massive clashes erupted when a mob rained stones on security force personnel searching for militants in Nazneenpora village of south Kashmir's Pulwama district on Saturday evening, forcing authorities to impose a curfew. Security forces blew up the house in which the militants were holed up.

The heavy stone-throwing by the mob, though not a new phenomenon, appears to be a brazen defiance of the Army chief 's recent statement that stone-throwers disrupting security operations would face “tough action“ and “relentless operations, maybe with harsher measures“. Reports said the forces cordoned off the village and, when the search began, militant sympathisers emerged from their houses and resorted to heavy stone-pelting to disrupt the operation.