SRINAGAR: Indian security personnel killed a suspected fighter in a gunbattle in occupied Kashmir on Wednesday, police said, in the first clash since the Indian government revoked the special status of the disputed territory early this month.

Leaders opposed to Indian rule over the restive region, meanwhile, urged people to defy a ban and join a mass march after Friday prayers this week, the first such call since the controversial decision taken by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Hundreds of political leaders and activists, most of them seeking held Kashmir’s independence or merger with Pakistan, have been incarcerated and the appeal for a march to the public came through posters that appeared overnight in Srinagar.

The gunbattle that erupted in Baramulla in northern Kashmir left two policemen wounded, one of whom died later in hospital, police said.

Groups fighting Indian rule in occupied Kashmir have vowed to carry on their armed struggle after Modi’s government lifted restrictions on property purchases and government jobs and opened them up to people from outside the restive region.

Thousands of additional paramilitary troops have been deployed in the disputed region to control the situation and on Tuesday night they raided the old part of Baramulla, a police officer said.

Suspected fighters fired a grenade, wounding two policemen, the officer said.

Friday march

Every person, young and old, men and women, should march after Friday prayers, the Joint Resistance Leadership, which represents all major groups opposing Indian rule in the region, said on one poster.

The public must march to the office of the UN Military Observer group in Srinagar, which was set up in 1949 after the first war between India and Pakistan over Kashmir.

According to analysts, the Indian government’s move to revoke the special status of Jammu and Kashmir would cause further alienation in the disputed region and fuel the 30-year uprising in which at least 50,000 people have already been killed.

Crowds have demonstrated frequently in Srinagar despite a ban on public gatherings and the severe restriction of phone and internet services.

One of the posters said the Indian government planned to change the demographics of Kashmir by flooding it with outsiders and urged clerics to speak about these fears during their sermons on Friday.

In the Soura part of Srinagar, where protests have flared, some residents said they would try to join the protests.

“We will try, people will try to go,” said one middle-aged man, who declined to be identified, after reading a poster pasted at a crossroads near the area’s main mosque.

“But we don’t know if they will let us,” he said.

In the Zainakadal area of Srinagar’s old quarter, where all shops were shuttered, and few people roamed, residents said they hadn’t heard of the call for protests.

“If our leaders call, we will come out,” a man said, who also declined to be identified.

“There will be protests, our protests won’t stop.”

On Tuesday, one person was critically wounded when security forces fired pellets in Srinagar’s Fatehkadal area during some stone-throwing by protesters, a senior police official and a government official said.

“He is on a ventilator,” the government official said of the wounded man.

Published in Dawn, August 22nd, 2019