Srinagar, July 06: At least five persons, including a policeman, were injured here as police fired teargas shells and used batons to disperse a crowd protesting against the alleged failure of authorities to locate a student who went missing four days back. The clash took place at Badshah chowk and spread to adjoining Maisuma, Gawkadal, Red Cross road and Koker Bazar in the heart of the city.
Several hundred people blocked the main road by staging a sit-in, demanding whereabouts of the missing student Asrar Mushtaq Dar, official sources said. Dar, a 2nd year student of Islamia College, allegedly went missing from his Maisuma locality on Friday when the area witnessed a violent clash between police and stone-pelting mobs.
They were protesting against the killing of four persons in Baramulla district. Suspecting that the youth might have been arrested by police, the residents of Maisuma, including a large number of women, took to the streets and staged a sit-in at Badshah chowk this afternoon, bringing normal activities to a grinding halt, the sources said.
Some protesters also pelted stones on passing vehicles and within no time all shopkeepers in the areas downed their shutters, while traffic was diverted through other routes, they said. Senior police officers, who rushed to the scene, tried to disperse the crowd.
But when the situation went out of control, police swung into action and used force to disperse them, the sources said, adding five persons including a policeman were injured in the pitched battles.
—-PTI–