Officials and residents said on Saturday there was widespread anger in some remote areas of Kashmir after three civilians were killed in military custody. This happened two days after four soldiers were killed in an ambush by insurgents.
Local residents said the Indian army detained at least eight civilians for questioning on Friday, a day after rebels fighting Indian rule ambushed two army vehicles in southern Poonch, killing four soldiers and wounding three others.
Poonch and Rajouri districts are close to the highly militarized Line of Control that divides the disputed Himalayan region between India and Pakistan.
Local residents accused army personnel of torturing the three to death in a nearby army camp. The bodies were later handed over to the local police, who immediately contacted the families. Residents said the bodies bore signs of severe torture.
Five other detainees were taken to a military hospital after brutal torture, their families said.
Resident Mohammed Younis said soldiers came to his Topa Peer village in Poonch district on Friday morning and detained nine villagers, including his two brothers and a cousin. The elderly man was released, he said, but the others were mercilessly beaten and electrocuted.
“My two brothers and cousin are badly injured due to torture. He is being treated at a military hospital,” Mr. Younis said after seeing one of his brothers.
Videos purported to show the torture of the detained civilians went viral hours after they were jailed, sparking widespread outrage.
Authorities cut internet services on smart devices in Poonch and Rajouri on Saturday morning, a common tactic to disperse potential protests and discourage the spread of videos.
Lt. Col. Suneel Bartwal, an Indian army spokesman, said a search operation for the militants responsible for the attack was ongoing since Thursday evening, adding that he had no “inputs” about the circumstances surrounding the deaths of the three civilians.
Senior police and civil officials visited the village and supervised the funerals. Local officials said the police would investigate the incident in an attempt to reassure villagers.
Nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan administer parts of Kashmir, but both claim the territory as a whole.
Militants in the Indian Kashmir region have been fighting the New Delhi government since 1989. Most Kashmiri Muslims support the rebels’ goal of uniting the territory either under Pakistani rule or as an independent state.
India insists that Kashmiri militancy is Pakistan-backed terrorism. Pakistan denies the allegations and most Kashmiris see it as a legitimate freedom struggle. Tens of thousands of civilians, rebels and government forces were killed in these conflicts.
Since 2019, however, the territory has been seething with anger as Delhi ended the region’s semi-autonomy and drastically curtailed dissent, civil liberties and media freedoms while intensifying counter-insurgency operations.
While many militants have been killed in counter-insurgency operations in the Kashmir Valley, the heartland of the anti-India insurgency, far-flung Rajouri and Poonch have seen deadly attacks against Indian troops in the past two years. At least three dozen soldiers were killed in such attacks.
