[Reader-list] The other Shopian story

[S. Jabbar]

Indian Express
8 killed, Shopian village stays indoors after dark
Mir Ehsan Posted online: Monday , Dec 21, 2009 at 0440 hrs

Keller (Shopian) : Eight killings around Shopian¹s remote Keller village in
the past eight months have struck fear in the villagers who now hardly
venture out of their houses after dusk.

On Tuesday evening, Sheeraza Akthar, 21, was shot inside her house by
unidentified militants. Three days later, militants again struck in the
neighbouring Kadipora village where, police said, two unknown masked gunmen
entered the house of Nazir Ahmad Chopan and shot him. Like Akthar, Chopan
also died on the spot.

³After the series of killings, everyone here is scared. We do not dare to
move out from our houses during the evening hours. Villagers now bolt the
doors of their house before dusk,² said Khurshid Ahmad, an agricultural
labourer, who lives at Hirgam Keller.

³The killings, especially of women, have left people worried. We want to
know why civilians are being killed like this?² he asked.

Another villager, Jalaluddin, who runs a grocery shop in the village, said,
³After the killings, our friends and relatives from outside villages have
stopped visiting our village.²

He said after the killings, government officials too are reluctant to visit
Keller.

Keller, with some 800 households, is fringed by forests and is one of the
most landscaped villages of south Kashmir¹s Shopian district.

Police have held a militant module active in the area responsible not only
for the recent killings. The module is reportedly headed by a foreigner and
comprises five to six militants.