Conducted girls tour despite criticism: GoC
Srinagar, Dec 16 (KNS): After the two families of three persons who have gone missing since November 17 accused Territory Army (TA) trooper of being involved in their disappearance, the army on Wednesday said it has ordered probe into the disappearance of these persons of north Kashmir’s Kupwara district.
Addressing a news conference here, General Officer in Command (GOC) 15 corps, LT Gen Satish Kumar Dua, said that the army has ordered an inquiry into the missing case of three men.
Stating that the army is committed to zero tolerance on human rights violation, GoC said, “We have ordered an inquiry into the case and if the role of army is established, the involved persons will be dealt with strictly.”
Three persons, Ghulam Jeelani Khatana (42), son of Karim Din and Mir Hussain Khatana (45) son of Muhammad Ismail, residents of Gojar Patti (Satbonya) in Dardepora, and Ali Muhammad Sheikh (40) son of Abdul Aziz of Dolipora Trehgam are missing since they were allegedly taken away by Manzoor Ahmad Khowaja (TA man) of Dardepora on November 17 of this year.
Khowaja has since been arrested and is being interrogated in police custody.
About Manigam encounter, GoC said that they have killed only two militants there and failed to kill all the militants present there.
“We don’ want to create inconvenience to the residents there and in this regard we have called off the encounter but on initial level it is going on,” GoC said, adding that they also lost the officer in the encounter.
“Before it is more snow fall, there may be a chance that the militants would try to attack in some areas,” he said.
While referring to the girls who recently came from ten days of national tour, GoC said that despite severe criticism they carried on with the tour. “In ten days of tour, the girls visited Agra, parliament, and met with HRD Minister, Smriti Irani, and visited several universities and colleges, which will boost them in future,” GoC said.
He said that there was not any kind of controversy during planning of tour but after the girls went to tour the controversy took place on social networking sites, which is not bound in any aspect.
“As an organization, we went ahead with the aim to do something beneficial for the girls. This was a very voluntary tour, and before going on tour we consulted their parents,” he said.
He said that almost 80 girls were ready to go on tour with them. “However, we conducted an interview in which only 30 girls got passed and later we went on tour,” he said.
GoC said such kind of criticism is nothing new in Kashmir and they didn’t have any such intention to highlight the tour but when anyone meets with higher officials of the country that generally becomes news otherwise they didn’t had any other intention. (KNS)
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