By IANS,
Srinagar : A mob torched a Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) vehicle on a highway Wednesday, while intermittent clashes between the police and stone-throwing protesters continued in curfew-bound Baramulla district of north Kashmir.
The angry mob torched the vehicle at Palhalan on the Srinagar-Baramulla highway, 35 km from here, Wednesday afternoon. The armed occupants of the vehicle reportedly did not retaliate to avoid any civilian casualty.
Four youth have been killed in the violence in Baramulla since Monday.
Sporadic clashes also occurred in uptown Maisuma locality of summer capital Srinagar Wednesday, and left around half-a-dozen people injured. Protests were also held in south Kashmir’s Anantnag and north Kashmir’s Bandipora districts.
In Sopore town of north Kashmir, protesters fought pitched battles with police who used batons and tear smoke shells to disperse the irate mobs.
The protests erupted in Baramulla Monday after a local woman alleged she was abused by the police inside the police station.
The allegations were denied by the police, who said the woman’s husband had facilitated the abduction of a minor girl in the town by the woman’s brother.
Both the girl and her abductor were traced by the police.
The abducted girl’s father said he was present all along in the police station when the woman visited the place and her allegations were totally baseless. She was trying to divert public attention from the crimes committed by her brother and husband, the girl’s father alleged.
Meanwhile, the paramilitary CRPF was withdrawn from Baramulla town Wednesday and law and order duties were assigned to the local police.
The CRPF units were withdrawn after a shooting incident Tuesday in which a youth – Fayaz Ahmad Gojri, 17 – was killed by a CRPF trooper. The police have registered a case of murder against the trooper.