Valley politicians on Thursday accused police of trying to bully them into silence after the force threatened them with “penal provisions” for publicly questioning its probe into a controversial “gunfight”.
A police special investigation team (SIT) had on Tuesday given a clean chit to the security forces in connection with a purported encounter that killed two businessmen, an associate and an alleged Pakistani militant in Srinagar in November.
Political parties, including some BJP allies, have termed the probe a cover-up and backed the slain businessmen’s families in alleging the police had murdered them in cold blood.
On Wednesday evening, the police warned the politicians and the victims’ families that their “speculative statements” have a “tendency to create provocation, rumour, fear and alarm among the general masses or particular section of society”.
“This kind of approach is against the rule of law and may attract appropriate penal provisions as envisaged under law,” the police statement said.
On Thursday, the politicians hit back. “Remarks on the SIT probe by different political parties are not mere speculation. They are grounded in facts,” People’s Democratic Party leader and former chief minister Mehbooba Mufti said.
“The administration’s aversion and discomfort with (the) truth coming to the fore is well known. Bullying us into silence by ‘penal action’ warnings won’t work.”
Another former chief minister, Omar Abdullah of the National Conference, said every citizen had the right to criticise and that it “does not behove J&K police to be trying to threaten people into submission”.
“If the SIT wants people to believe the report, it should report the truth, period,” Omar tweeted.
A police spokesperson said the SIT had come across “several posts on media from some political leaders and family members (of the victims) wherein they have cast doubt upon the evidence obtained by the SIT so far”.
The police statement said: “These people have tried to call it ‘concocted cover-up story’, ‘ornamental probe’, ‘clean chit to killers’, ‘fairy tale of police’, etc.”
CPM veteran Mohammad Yousuf Tarigami, spokesperson for the five-party Gupkar alliance that is fighting for restoration of Article 370, had called the investigation a “concocted cover-up story”.
Sajjad Lone and Altaf Bukhari, heads of political parties considered close to the Centre, had called the SIT probe “an ornamental probe” and a “clean chit to killers”.
The family of one of the victims had described the SIT findings as a “fairy tale of police”.
The police statement said the force had through a general notice “in electronic and print media” invited the public to have their statements recorded if they had “any acquaintance or knowledge or proof regarding the incident”.
“All such persons making statements should have approached the enquiry officer with genuine evidence they have, for corroboration or contradiction of the facts surfaced in the case,” the police statement said.
It claimed the force was “still investigating the matter” — although the SIT had on Tuesday publicly given a clean chit to the police.
The SIT, headed by deputy inspector-general Sujit Kumar, had claimed that businessman Altaf Bhat, owner of the building where the alleged gunfight took place, had died in crossfire after a lone militant used him as a human shield.
Mudassir Gul, the other businessman, was allegedly killed by the militant, who the police claim was hiding in the building.
The families allege the police used the businessmen as human shields and later killed them.
A relative of Bhat alleged the police were lying when they said the family was repeatedly summoned to present their evidence before the SIT.
He said the police had called the family mainly to send them on a wild goose chase to find “documents of the building and the details of the tenants”, most of which the police had already seized from the building.
