SRINAGAR, June 16: Twenty-three people, most of them civilians and freedom-fighters, were killed in a sudden escalation of violence in Indian-held Kashmir, police said on Sunday.

Five Hindus were shot dead and three others critically injured on Sunday when suspected activists opened fire on a village in south Kashmir, police said.

“They entered their home and opened indiscriminate fire, killing five of the villagers instantly,” a police spokesman said. “Three others were seriously injured.”

The attack occurred at Balmakote village in Kashmir’s Udhampur district, 200km north of Jammu, he said.

In a separate incident, three village guards were killed by freedom activists in northern Doda district overnight.

“The members of the Village Defence Committee were all Muslims. Three other guards were also injured when they started firing on them,” the spokesman said.

In another incident in the restive region, Indian border guards backed by the army killed four freedom-fighters in a shootout in the central Kashmir district of Budgam, a spokesman for India’s Border Security Force (BSF) said.

A civilian who strayed into the crossfire was also killed.

“The encounter erupted once BSF personnel sealed off a hide-out in the district and asked the militants inside to surrender,” he said.

The activists instead opened fire which was returned by the security forces, resulting in the death of the men who belonged to Hizbul Mujahedin.

“One of the slain was a commander,” the BSF spokesman said, adding that a number of other suspects had been arrested and were being questioned.

Three AK-47 assault rifles and a radio receiver set were recovered from the hide-out.

Residents and Hizbul said two of the five dead men were civilians, one of them killed by troops after he stepped outside of his house.

Four Indian army soldiers were injured in the gun-battle, officials said.

In other incidents, an officer of the counter-insurgency police was killed and another injured in an ambush in Pulwama, while the security forces shot dead four activists in the northern Kashmir districts of Kupwara and Baramulla.

In Kupwara a civilian was shot dead on Sunday, while two activists, a border guard and a civilian were killed elsewhere in Kashmir.

A civilian was injured in a landmine explosion at Hatlanga along the Line of Control in northern Uri sector. —AFP