J&K Police set up SIT to probe civilian killings in Rajouri

The SIT has been set up by deputy inspector general of police, Rajouri Poonch range, Haseeb Mughal, which will work under the supervision of Rajouri SSP Mohammad Aslam and be headed by area DSP (headquarters) Chanchal Singh

The Jammu and Kashmir Police have constituted a special investigating team (SIT) to probe the killing of two civilians in a firing incident outside an army camp in Rajouri district, officials said on Tuesday.

The killings had led to massive protests on Friday with people demanding a fair probe into the incident. (PTI file)

The SIT has been set up by deputy inspector general of police, Rajouri Poonch range, Haseeb Mughal, which will work under the supervision of Rajouri SSP Mohammad Aslam and be headed by area DSP (headquarters) Chanchal Singh.

Its members will be inspector Danish Maqbool, probationary sub-inspector Jatinder Sharma and two head constables.

“I will be supervising the progress. Though no deadline has been given to the SIT, the probe report will be submitted at the earliest,” SSP Aslam said.

The SIT has been asked to update day-to-day progress of investigation with the range police headquarters, officials said.

The team will investigate the incident of firing that took place at the alpha gate of the army camp in the Phalyana area of Rajouri in which two local men -- Surinder Kumar and Kamal Kumar -- were killed, while one Anil Kumar from Uttarakhand was injured.

The killings had led to massive protests with people demanding a fair probe into the incident.

The army’s Nagrota-based 16 Corps had issued a tweet shortly after the Friday incident and attributed the gunfire to “unidentified terrorists”, but in a handwritten assurance with the signatures of the district administration, police and a senior army official later, the corps had assured compensation to those killed and that “wrongful tweets” would be deleted.

The SIT will be recording the statements of eyewitnesses, locals, and family members of the victims.

On December 17, a day after the killings, J&K lieutenant governor Manoj Sinha had announced an ex gratia relief of ₹5 lakh each for the kin of two men.