SRINAGAR, Dec 20: Noisy protests were held across occupied Kashmir on Friday, coinciding with a general strike and an upsurge of killings that saw a lawmaker shot dead and two women beheaded after apparently violating warnings over dress by a shadowy group.

The strike and demonstrations were held to protest death sentences given to three Kashmiris by a New Delhi court on Wednesday for their roles in a deadly attack on the Indian parliament in December last year.

The strike, which began on Thursday, brought Srinagar to a halt for the second consecutive day.

Police said they had resorted to cane charges and fired teargas shells at protesters on several occasions. Two policemen and six Muslim youths were injured in running battles.

Shops, businesses and many offices in Srinagar kept their doors shut, while Indian police and paramilitary troops patrolled sensitive areas of the town.

The heavy police presence, however, was not enough to prevent the assassination in full public view of a ruling party legislator, Abdul Aziz Mir, as he was leaving a mosque in Pampore, on the outskirts of Srinagar.

A police spokesman said Aziz, a People’s Democratic Party (PDP) lawmaker, was leaving the mosque at the end of Friday prayers when suspected militants emerged from the crowd and opened fire.

“Owing to the presence of the crowd, Mir’s bodyguards could not retaliate,” a police official said.

Mir was transferred to Srinagar’s main hospital where he later died of blood loss, according to a doctor.

In other incidents, two Muslim women were beheaded and a third gunned down in Rajouri district on Thursday, just days after militants had issued a warning that a strict dress code should be followed, police said.

A spokesman said a group of militants entered Hasiot village, in Rajouri district, 150kms from occupied Jammu, and killed the three college students.

The spokesman said two women, who were cousins, were beheaded and a third was shot dead. They were all aged between 18 and 20.

Police believed the killings could be linked to the dress code warning, coming just two days after militants of the Lashker-i-Jabbar (LeJ) had put up posters at the college ordering women students to wear burqas, and men to wear sherwanis (traditional coats) and caps.

The general strike was called jointly by the Hizbul Mujahideen, Al Umar Mujahideen, Dukhtaran-i-Milat and Human Rights Forum.

More than 10,000 people attended the march immediately after Friday prayers in the town, where there was a heavy police presence.

The protesters marched from Baramulla’s main mosque to the main bus stand, a distance of nearly two kilometres.—AFP