SRINAGAR: Normal life in Kashmir has been affected due to a strike called by the joint advisory council of separatists to demand the return of Mohammad Afzal Guru’s body to his family.
Shops and other businesses are closed and public transport is off the roads.
The police and paramilitaries have been deployed in strength.
Protests were held at Maisuma area in Srinagar, Trehgam, Handwara and Langate in north Kashmir and Shopian in south Kashmir. But the protesters dispersed off peacefully, witnesses said.
There were minor clashes between youth and the police at Kawadara in Srinagar and Khanpora in Baramulla. But no major violence was reported from anywhere.
The Mutahida Majlis e Mashawarat (MMM), a joint council of various separatist groups, had asked people to observe a shutdown on Friday as part of its protest strategy to demand the return of Afzal Guru’s body.
Guru was hanged and buried at Tihar jail on Feb 9.
Three people died during clashes between protesters and the police and paramilitaries in Kashmir as a curfew imposed by the authorities immediately after the hanging lasted for seven days.
But life remained on a standstill as the hardline faction of the separatist alliance Hurriyat conference issued programmes asking people to continue protest and observe days of shutdown.
However then the MMM was formed to devise a joint protest programme – with sustainability as a main consideration – to press for demands of returning Guru’s body for burial in the valley.
It comprises both factions of the Hurriyat, the pro-independence JKLF, the Bar Association and Dukhtaran-e-Millat, a women’s separatist group –
It issued it first programme Monday last.
People have been asked to hoist red ribbons on shops, houses and vehicles tomorrow as part of the protest schedule.
Afzal Guru’s family has written to union home ministry seeking his mortal remains as have the chief minister Omar Abdullah and PDP patron Mufti Mohammed Sayeed.
New Delhi has not formally turned down the requests so far. But there are no positive indications that Guru’s body will be sent to Kashmir, where people have reserved an empty grave for him at the “Martyr’s Graveyard” in Srinagar.
The epitaph mentions him as “martyr of the homeland”. “His body lies as a trust with the government of India,” it reads.
The MMM is expected to release a fresh agitation calender on Saturday or Sunday.
