SRINAGAR, Feb 11: Three young people have died in violence in Indian-held Kashmir despite a curfew that continued for a third day on Monday following the execution of Mohammed Afzal Guru for allegedly attacking India’s parliament in 2001.

Protests and clashes between troops and demonstrators broke out at a dozen places. Police and paramilitary soldiers lobbed teargas shells and used batons to chase away rock-throwing protesters.

The protests coincided with the 29th anniversary of the execution of Mohammed Maqbool Butt, the founder of the Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front.  Several activists tried to hold a procession in Butt’s honour in Srinagar, but police chased them away.

In Watergam village near Sopore, which was Guru’s home, 12-year-old Obaid Mushtaq died of injuries after police and paramilitary troops fired tear gas shells and bullets a day earlier to disperse an angry crowd. An 18-year-old boy injured in the clashes was on life support.

Another young man died in Sumbal village in northern part of held Kashmir on Sunday after he jumped into a frigid river while trying to run away from troops who were firing tear gas and swinging batons. The body of a high school student who had been missing since Sunday’s protest was also recovered.

Thousands attended the funeral processions of the two young men on Monday. Cable television and mobile Internet services were shut down in most of the region and Kashmir’s nearly 60 newspapers were unable to publish.—AP