Omar removes Srinagar top cop after youth killed in police firing

SRINAGAR: Taking a serious view of the incident which led to the death of one person in firing by security forces, Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah on Sunday removed the city’s top cop. Mr Reyaz Bedar, Srinagar’s Senior Superintendent of Police, was replaced by Mr Syed Ashiq Bukhari after a high-level meeting chaired by the chief minister reviewed the law and order situation. Mr Bukhari was SSP, counter-intelligence , before being asked to take charge of the state capital.

The meeting, attended by state DGP Kuldeep Khoda, special Director General of CRPF N K Tripathy and other officers, was held after the firing incident in which the CRPF was reported to have fired at the mob.

The chief minister made it clear to the police and paramilitary forces that they must exercise utmost restraint in dealing with the public.

Police say they opened fire in self-defence as angry mobs attacked a police post and made a bid to ransack a CRPF camp in Noorbagh belt. It all started with the formal death declaration of Mohammad Rafiq Bangroo by the doctors at SKIMS. Bangroo, a 25-year old Safa Kadal resident, was allegedly beaten by CRPF jawans on June 12 and was critically injured.

He was declared dead on Saturday night. The family, apparently on police request , decided against burying him in Eidgah cemetery and hurriedly arranged the burial. After the funeral prayers were over, angry mobs started attacking the police and CRPF. It was in retaliation to these assaults especially on the bunker that the CRPF opened fire in which five persons were hit by bullets. One of them, Javed Ahmad Malla, who had received a bullet in his head, succumbed to his injuries within less than an hour in SMHS hospital.