[Mr.
Wani had become a prominent face of separatist sentiment in the Kashmir valley,
an area at the center of an independence movement that has waned since its peak
in the 1990s, at the height of an insurgency, but that has never completely
disappeared.]
By Hari Kumar and Nida Najar
 |
Protesters clashed with the police in
Saturday after security forces killed a separatist militant commander.Credit
Tauseef Mustafa/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
|
The
death toll from two days of violence rose to at least 19 on Sunday, according
to a police official in Srinagar
In
addition to the protesters who were killed, a policeman died when protesters
pushed the vehicle he had been driving into the Jhelum River
The
demonstrations began Saturday after security forces killed Burhan Muzaffar Wani,
a young commander for the Hizbul Mujahedeen, a Kashmiri rebel group.
Mr.
Wani had become a prominent face of separatist sentiment in the Kashmir valley, an area at the center of an
independence movement that has waned since its peak in the 1990s, at the height
of an insurgency, but that has never completely disappeared.
Both
India Pakistan territory of Kashmir
Security
forces have been accused of human rights abuses while struggling to contain the
insurgency and its aftermath.
The
police statement said protesters throughout the valley had attacked police
stations, police cars, a fire truck and a railway station, setting fire to
security vehicles and government property. The statement also said individuals
the police suspect to be militants either lobbed grenades or fired at security
officers in three areas of the valley.
Curfew
continued in the entire valley of Kashmir
Hospitals
in Kashmir received more than 400 injured, said Dr. Adil
Ashraf of the Shri
Maharaja Hari Singh Hospital Srinagar
Dr.
Ashraf, whose hospital receives information about casualties from all
government hospitals in the valley, said 22 people had died in the violence in
the past two days.
The
Jammu and
Kashmir
Mr.
Wani had become prominent in the valley in part because he was the rare example
of a local rebel who had attached his face to his cause. He was active on
social media, garnering a following as he posted photographs of himself and his
associates in battle fatigues, often carrying arms.
“He
was not personally associated with violence so much, but was associated with
leadership,” said Syed Ata Hasnain, a retired Indian Army general who spent
more than two decades serving in Kashmir .
He said Mr. Wani had “conveyed the message of azadi,” or freedom, a word that
has been a battle cry in Kashmir for decades.
But
the scale of the outpouring of anger at the security establishment that Kashmir witnessed over the weekend could not be
explained by Mr. Wani’s appeal alone, some analysts said.
Gull
Mohammad Wani, a professor of political science at the University of Kashmir
Mr.
Wani lamented that violence in Kashmir had become “the only means of communicating
with Delhi
“A
political response from the government is missing,” said Mohammed Yousuf
Tarigami, a lawmaker in Kashmir for the past two decades.
