Hours after the family of Inayat Ahmad Mir, who was killed in Pulwama gunfight on Sunday, claimed his innocence, a new video surfaced on the social media in which one of the family members is seen admitting that the slain was with the militants in the house.
In a fifty eight second video posted on social media, 17-year-old Inayat’s sister [name not mentioned] could be seen saying that it was on Thursday at 10 pm when three militants took shelter in their house situated in Naira village of Pulwama district in south Kashmir.
She said that during the evacuation process [by the government forces] she, her younger sister and mother came out from the house, but Inayat decided to stay back with the militants and die with them.
She said that she got afraid and lied to the forces that there is nobody inside the house, despite having the full knowledge of the presence of the militants inside.
The video has also been shared by the official Twitter handle of Kashmir Zone Police and Pulwama Police to counter the family’s version of the story about the gunfight.
The video confession is contrary to the claims made by the family earlier in the day when they were outside the Police Control Room (PCR) in Srinagar to demand Inayat’s body.
The family members that include Inayat’s younger sister Rohi Jaan, father Ghulam Qadir Mir and mother Mughli Begum, while talking with the media, said that their son wasn’t present in the home when the gunfight took place.
As per the family, Inayat was at his maternal home in Trisal village when the gunfight took place. “His [Inayat) grandmother expired two days back,” said the father, Mir. “So, all the family along with him were there [maternal home] for the past two days.”
Mir said it was around 4:30 pm on Saturday Inayat went home to feed cattle as there was no male member available to look after the domestic animals.
“Apart from my two daughters – one of them pregnant – there was no one at home,” said Mir. “So, I asked Inayat to go home and feed the animals. That was the last time I saw him. I don’t know how he was killed.”
Inayat’s mother Mughli Begum had earlier told reporters: “My son was innocent, he was with me for the past two days at my maternal home. All we want is to get our son’s body. We are not demanding anything else.”
In the morning, the police said that three militants and a ‘hybrid militant’ were killed in the gunfight at Jan’s house. Inayat was one among the dead. “It was only in the morning that we [family] came to know that he [Inayat] was killed in the gunfight,” said Begum.
A few hours after the gunfight was over, the Inspector General of Police (Kashmir) Vijay Kumar told the reporters that the house owner’s son Inayat Ahmed was asked to surrender but he along with militants opened fire at the forces and got killed.
“He was a hybrid militant,” said Kumar. He also added that the house owner, Ghulam Qadir Mir – Inayat’s father, will be booked under Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA) – with a punishment of not less than five years.
