December 27th, Indian-administered Kashmir police accused an Indian officer and his two informants of shooting three civilians, forging the scene of the “gunfight”, and falsely framing the victim as anti-government armed personnel.
The incident occurred in July this year. At that time, the Indian military issued a statement that a gun battle in the Indian-administered village of Amhibola in southern Kashmir, killing three people and finding weapons on the dead. The military hurriedly buried the dead in a remote border area.
A month later, the families of the deceased living in the Lajulili Mountains of Kashmir identified the victims through photos circulated on social networking sites. They said that all three of them were civilians and only came to the apple orchard near the scene of the accident to find a job.
After the incident was exposed, it caused public anger on social networks, and the police and the military opened independent investigations. AFP reported that this move is very rare in India.
In the investigation report released on the 27th, the police said that an officer named Bupendra Singh and the other two “required the illegally obtained weapons and materials on the corpse after taking the identification objects on the body and characterizing them as die-hard terrorists who hold war materials”.
The report also mentions that the three bodies were exhumed in September, genetically tested, and returned to the families of the deceased.
The police took Bupendra Singh to the district court on charges of murder, conspiracy, etc., and the two informants have also been detained.
The court will ask whether the Indian military will be referred to ordinary courts or military courts.
According to the Special Powers of the Armed Forces Act promulgated by the Indian government in India-administered Kashmir in 1990, violations of the law by the Garrison require the consent of the Government of India before they can be tried by ordinary courts.
Over the past 30 years, thousands of civilians have died in military operations. Despite repeated police investigations, the Indian government has not authorized ordinary courts to hear them.
The Associated Press reported that a similar incident occurred in the Indian-administered Kashmir region in 2010, when Indian soldiers shot and killed three civilians for a reward, triggering a large-scale protest.
