Angry villagers pelt stones at Mehbooba Mufti’s cavalcade

SRINAGAR - Angry villagers pelted stones and shouted anti-India slogans Sunday when opposition People’s Democratic Party (PDP) leader Mehbooba Mufti visited Jammu and Kashmir’s Nadihal village to condole the deaths of three locals who were killed in a staged shootout in Machil sector along the Line of Control (LOC).

According to police here, the villagers pelted stones at the cavalcade of Mehbooba Mufti in the village in Baramulla district in the afternoon. “She has returned back safely now,” a senior police officer said.

PDP sources said Mehbooba Mufti visited two bereaved families to offer condolences.

“When she went to the house of the bereaved families in the village, some youth pelted stones and shouted anti-India slogans,” party sources here said.

Mehbooba Mufti has since safely returned to summer capital Srinagar.

Three villagers belonging to Nadihal village were allegedly abducted April 27 and killed as separatist guerrillas in the Machil sector of the LOC April 30.

Three people, including a soldier of the territorial army, have been arrested in the staged shootout case that the local police are investigating after the bodies of the slain villagers were exhumed and identified by the relatives May 28.

Police have also booked a major of the army in this case.

The state government has ordered a magisterial probe into the staged shootout and the army authorities have said they would fully cooperate with the police to bring the guilty to justice.