Category: Union Territory

Srinagar: A soldier injured in an exchange of fire with militants in Lam forest area of Tral in south Kashmir’s Pulwama district on Tuesday has succumbed, police sources said.
They said that soldier, identified as Ajay Kumar of 42 RR, was shifted to 92 Base hospital in Srinagar where he succumbed.

A police official said the militants opened fire on a forces’ party in the area early morning, resulting in a brief shootout.

He said that the militants are believed to have escaped towards upper forest area after the initial exchange of fire.
A search operation jointly launched by the army, SOG of Jammu and Kashmir Police and the CRPF to nab the militants is going on, he said.
Meanwhile, clashes erupted in main town Tral after youth hurled rocks at a forces’ vehicle. The forces responded by firig tear gas.

An official said that a joint team of army’s 42 RR, Special Operations Group of Jammu and Kashmir Police and Central Reserve Police Force launched a search operation in Lam forests.

Police on Tuesday said that there was an exchange of fire between militants and forces in Lam forest area in Tral township of south Kashmir’s Pulwama district.
An official said that a joint team of army’s 42 RR, Special Operations Group of Jammu and Kashmir Police and Central Reserve Police Force launched a search operation in Lam forests.

He said that militants hiding in the forest area fired upon the forces, resulting in a brief exchange of fire.
After firing on the forces, he said, the militants – believed to be three in number – fled from the spot.
“Search operation is going on in the area. The cordon has been tightened,” he said.

SRINAGAR: Under very nose of Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC), since last 6 years Presentation Convent School Srinagar School has been neglecting to pay sanitation fee towards SMC.

Sources said that the school has not been paying sanitation fee towards SMC from last 6 years but till date no action has been taken by the authorities.

Sources confirmed Press Trust of Kashmir that the school has not been paying sanitation fee towards SMC Srinagar as they have to pays 10000 rupee per month to wards SMC dept.

It is pertinent to mention that valley’s top most school located in Srinagar’s posh Rajbagh area is found to be involved in an unholy nexus with the employees of Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) from the last many years.

The Presentation Convent according to reliable sources told Press Trust of Kashmir that is not at all paying sanitation fee towards the SMC but on the other hand SMC lifts huge amount of garbage from Presentation Convent School on daily basis.

Sources also confirmed Press Trust of Kashmir that the Convent School Srinagar has a monthly income of more than 17 lakhs but it seems in no mood to pay mere Rs 5000 to Rs 6000 towards the SMC with proper receipt.

The Safai Karamcharis of Srinagar Municipal Corporation (SMC) regularly take out huge garbage from the school premises as more than 2000 students are on the school rolls at Presentation Convent School.

Press Trust of Kashmir reveals that SMC officials are not charging any monthly fee from the Presentation Convent School management for lifting the huge garbage which gets accumulated in the school premises.

Sources further said that “even if the monthly fee is collected that may be collected illegally by the SMC officials without giving any receipt to school authorities. Sources confirmed that the school management never ever pays a single rupee towards SMC Srinagar.

When contact SMC chief sanitation officer Sofi Muhammad Akbar Bhat he told Press Trust of Kashmir that they will take action against the school management. He added that the school has more than 2000 students enrolled and they have to pay 10000 RS per month. “We will look into the matter and will issue notice to the school management”.

When contact presentation Convent Higher Secondary School they didn’t pick phone. (PTK)

Srinagar, Apr 22 : Class work will remain suspended at a few colleges in Srinagar on Monday as a precautionary measure to avoid student protests, officials said.
An official of District administration Srinagar told KNS that the class work will remain suspended at Amar Singh College, M A Road Women’s Degree College and Degree College Nawakadal in Srinagar tomorrow. “Rest of the educational institutions will remain open in the district,” official said. (KNS)

Stone pelting not Panacea to everything: Altaf Bukahri

Srinagar: Minister for School Education Syed Altaf Bukahri on Sunday said that the department will pass a formal order to ask coaching centers to “shut” their “shops” for at least 90 days with immediate effect and would revoke it after a review.

“We don’t want to shift focus. My focus is to have proper schooling. We were looking at distractions and one of the distractions we found was coaching centers. Perhaps the attendance of the students in coaching centers is more than schools. We by request and by passing an official order will ask coaching centers to shut their shops,” Education minister Altaf Bukhari told reporters after a meeting of chief education officers, zonal education officers and principals of higher secondary schools here.

Asked for how long the order will operate, the minister said: “In the first instance it would be for 90 days and we will review it later.”

Asked whether the government has been able to evolve any mechanism to prevent the protests, he according to GNS said: “See the mechanism is not for protests. Our focus should be that there are no distractions to the students. Today I saw lot be debated in newspapers. It’s simple that we are the custodian of the students. Our focus is entirely to see that student face no distraction. One of the distractions is that when our students take to streets, there are some elements, who are not our colleges or schools students, who get mingled with our students and they start pelting stones.”

He added: “Pelting stones is not the solution to everything. How can stone pelting give justice to the minor victim? Instead, we are doing injustice with somebody to whom we pelt stones upon. We are pelting stones on our own vehicles or our visitors. We don’t think of a ponny walla, houseboat owner or boatman who gets sustenance for the entire year (from tourism season.) Some of them have to arrange for the marriage of their daughters through this income only.”

He said that people who indulge in stone pelting don’t think how their action impacts the entire society.

“My mandate is to see how we can keep education system working. Our students are intelligent and I don’t want that they are lesser educated compared to their counterparts from outside. I can tell you with certainty that if we are able to provide the better atmosphere, they will excel and there will be none to compete with them.”

Asked whether schools and college will be reopened tomorrow, he said, “Opening or closing of colleges has nothing to do with my meeting. I am only trying to see how we can maintain peace and tranquility in these institutions. The decision (to close or keeping open schools and colleges) lies with directors and principles of schools and colleges and I don’t see any big reason why they should not.”

Asked about an earlier decision of the government to take the decision on closing and reopening of colleges and schools was left to the divisional and district authorities, he said: “We need do it as a team. Law and order is a problem which is dealt by them. It is a conscious decision. I would like to appeal people and parents to help us in keeping schools and colleges open. Please take care of students at the family level also and they should not get an impression that they are unwanted rather they should get the feeling that they are very special. The students are emotionally hurt by whatever is happening and we have to take care of all this. I request parents to help me and assure them I will provide the best education to them.”

He also asked the director school education Kashmir to submit the list of teachers, masters, and lecturers who are working in private coaching centers for “necessary action.”

The decision has been taken in view of widespread student protests over the gruesome gang rape-and-murder of an eight-year-old nomadic girl in Kathua. (GNS)

Japan: The world’s oldest person from Japan has died, reports said.

Believed to be world’s oldest person Nabi Tajima died at an age of 117 years.

Tajima, according to reports was born on Aug. 4, 1900, was the last known person born in the 19th century.

She reportedly had more than 160 descendants, including great-great-great grandchildren, reports said.

Her town of Kikai is in Kagoshima prefecture on Kyushu, the southernmost of Japan’s four main islands.

She had attained the stature of world’s oldest living person after the death in September of Violet Brown in Jamaica, also at the age of 117.

After Tajima’s death another Japanese woman Chiyo Miyako, has now become the world’s oldest person, according to the U.S.-based Gerontology Research Group.

Rahul Pandita

In 1755, a major earthquake destroyed the city of Lisbon, killing thousands of its inhabitants. It created a theological crisis of sorts in Europe, with ordinary people and philosophers alike questioning how a “kind God” would allow such suffering.

Since then, humans have brought so much destruction upon themselves that the only question one needs to ask of God is why men could turn so evil. As the philosopher Susan Neiman writes in ‘Evil in Modern Thought’, “The more responsibility for evil was left to the human, the less worthy the species seemed to take it on.”

Nowhere has this been more evident recently than in the Kathua case. We are not supposed to take her name, but how does one stop thinking about the girl who lies buried in an alien patch of land, away even from her temporary home in Kathua, where she played football by herself? Her parents have left, following the old tradition of their forefathers, negotiating one hill after another, setting up camp wherever they can, along with their livestock. The girl who cannot be named, the girl who had big eyes, the girl who the autopsy report said was 110 centimetres long, cannot accompany them any longer.

Immanuel Kant believed stupidity is caused by a wicked heart. To this the philosopher Hannah Arendt added that wickedness may be caused by absence of thought. In the case of the people who are in absolute denial about the circumstances that could have led to the girl’s death, perhaps both of these are true. Otherwise how can one explain their diabolical proclivity to spread lies or believe in lies about her murder? This is tantamount to mutilating the girl several times over.

In the past week, I have become sick with random news items landing in my email and other inboxes from such people or from others who get severely confused after reading them. “What do you have to say about this?” asked one, after he sent me a Facebook post on how the girl’s biological parents were dead and how her murder was a result of a property dispute. This is after her real parents had already been interviewed several times by journalists. Then another item was sent on how the “in charge” of the crime branch team was involved in the custodial death of a man and the rape of his sister in 2007 in Jammu’s Doda region. This pertained to one of the members of the team — not the in charge — who was accused but later exonerated of all charges and reinstated in the force with full benefits.

And then, I was flooded with screenshots of a report in a national Hindi daily that claimed that there had been no rape. I cringed at it. I had seen the autopsy report on January 17 itself, conducted on the day the girl was found dead, when the crime branch was not even involved in the case. The investigation officer at that time was the policeman who is now one of the accused in the case. But such facts do not matter to those who keep on brandishing their ignorance the way they waved the national flag earlier in favour of the accused.
There is no doubt that Jammu has some genuine concerns about the Rohingya influx. Last year, the state home department said in the assembly that there were 5,743 Rohingya in Jammu who had “entered the state on their own”. The number is believed to be much higher. India has provided sanctuary to refugees for centuries, but in this case one wonders how the Rohingya ended up so far in a state that has already seen polarisation and violence for decades. While the civil society in Jammu was well within its rights to raise this issue, it committed the mistake of conflating it with the girl’s brutal murder. And then, on April 9, a few lawyers in Kathua thought that shouting Jai Shri Ram would let them prevail over India’s Constitution.

Now we know one thing. The court will decide whether the accusations made in the chargesheet are true or not. But, so far, whatever has been produced as ‘evidence’ in favour of the accused has turned out to be false.

Till the court decides, it is time for everyone to quieten down. Let the judiciary do its job. In the meantime, listen to a song or something. I have personally taken solace in ‘Ek Lau’ from the movie, Aamir, sung beautifully by my friend Shilpa Rao. Also, if you can, take Yale historian Timothy Snyder’s advice and stay away from the internet as much as possible. Also, if you can, lock yourself in a room and read Hannah Arendt on the “banality of evil.”

(Pandita is the author of ‘Our Moon Has Blood Clots: A memoir of a lost home in Kashmir’ )

The Article Was First Published On Times Of India

Assures students quickest trial of Kathua rape accused, harshest punishment to convicts

Srinagar, Apr 21: Assuring students that government would ensure quickest trial of Kathua rape accused and harshest punishment to convicts, Minister for Education and Finance Syed Altaf Bukhari Saturday said “our children show wisdom and they should ensure that shortage of class attendance does not become an issue for them to sit in the examinations”.
According to KNS, talking to reporters, Altaf Bukhari asked students to control their emotions and return to classes to ensure that shortage of attendance does not become an issue for them to sit in the examination after few months.
Reposing trust and confidence in the students, Bukhari said “our children show wisdom in trying times and hope they would return to classes peacefully. I assure them that government would ensure quickest trial of the Kathua rape accused and harshest punishment to the convicts of that unpardonable crime. Today Union Cabinet is meeting and of central government passes an ordinance to allow courts for awarding death penalty to rape convicts the state government would also invoke a suitable legislation similar to the one which the central government would pass in the parliament. (KNS)

Srinagar, Apr 20: Class work to remain suspended tomorrow in all Srinagar colleges in view of prevailing law & order situation.
An official of District Administration Srinagar told KNS that class work in all Srinagar colleges to remain suspended tomorrow 21 April (Saturday), as a precautionary measure.

Srinagar: As student protests refuse to die, senior minister and Jammu and Kashmir Government spokesman Naeem Akhtar on Tuesday questioned the protests when all accused in the rape and murder of a minor girl had been arrested.

“What is the occasion for protests, stone-throwing when the case (at the police end) is solved, accused in jail and the trial is on? Shouldn’t they be attending classes instead,” Akthar tweeted.

The minister said the protests were only hurting the image and interests of the state.

“What is there to protest about? The case is solved, chargesheet filed, accused in custody, trial on. Those who still pelt stones in the name of the poor girl of Kathua are only hurting the image and interests of the state,” he wrote in another tweet.

While the government in a bid to stop student protests has been closing schools, colleges and universities, students continue to take to the streets.

Another senior PDP minister Imran Ansari has also urged the students to concentrate on studies. “I would strongly urge my young students to please concentrate on their studies. Understand your anguish against #Kathua but a trial is on. Ministers have resigned. Justice will be delivered. My message to you — pls study,” Ansari tweeted.

The protests also came in for censure by Director of Vigilance Javaid Gillani, who served as Inspector General of Police, Kashmir, during the 2016 unrest. “It is high time the students went back to their classrooms and stopped creating anarchy in the name of seeking justice for an unfortunate victim.”

“The chargesheet in the case has been filed in the court. In due course, the court would announce its verdict on the basis of the evidence presented before it. Those aggrieved with the verdict would have an option to go before a higher judicial forum. The due process of law would settle the issue and ensure justice is delivered. What are those on the street now protesting for? Wouldn’t the protests now be seen as an attempt to influence the judicial process? Public opinion should not be allowed to interfere with the judicial processes. Verdicts cannot be delivered on the streets. It is high time the students went back to their classrooms and stopped creating anarchy in the name of seeking justice for an unfortunate victim. Let them not become a tool to fulfil someone else’s agenda,” Gillani wrote in a Facebook post.