Srinagar, June 24 (KMS): In occupied Kashmir, a pall of gloom and grief gripped the Kokernag village of Islamabad when dead body of a 22-year-old labourer, Muhammad Ashraf Sheikh, reached the area after exhumation.

The exhumation was executed on the orders of district magistrate Bandipora. Sheikh's family members identified the body, and later brought it to Press Enclave in Srinagar where they protested, demanding an impartial probe. Later the body was taken to Kokernag for the last rites.

Ashraf, a resident of Pehlipora-Drawey in Kokernag had gone missing on June 3, from Dalgate Srinagar and was killed near Brar village in Bandipora the same day by the Indian troops in a fake encounter. Ashraf’s family members, after failing to trace him, submitted a missing report at Nehru Park police Station Srinagar on June 16.

Earlier, the Bandipora police had registered an FIR on June 3 and stated that Sheikh was murdered and the body was handed over to it by 3-Jammu and Kashmir Light Infantry Division (JAKLI). People in Brar village, stated that troopers of 3 JAKLI brought a youth in a Tata Sumo vehicle and shot him dead. The police, after completing all medico legal formalities, handed over the dead body to Jamia Auqaf Nassu for burial. The investigation of the case was set in motion and statements of witnesses were recorded. However, on June 22, Nazir Ahmad Sheikh, brother of the deceased, approached the Police Station Bandipore claiming that it was body of his brother. After which the exhumation of the body was carried.

As soon as Ashraf’s body reached his native village, thousands of people who had gathered to perform last rites shouted anti-India and pro-liberation slogans and demanded stern action against the culprits.

Ashraf belongs to village of Abdul Rehman Padder, a carpenter who was killed in a fake encounter by Special Operation Group (SOG) personnel in December 2006 on the outskirts of Ganderbal district.