As the authorities on Friday morning handed over the bodies of two civilians to the families for the proper burial, Amir Ahmad Magray’s family has also reached out to the district administration Ramban for the mortal remains of their son as well.
A resident of Barzulla, Muhammad Altaf Bhat, a businessman and resident of Budgam, Mudasir Gul, who also ran an office in the same building, where the alleged gunfight took place on Monday, were shot dead along with Amir Ahmad Magray, a resident of Ramban and employee of Gul. The police claimed that the trio were killed along with a foreign militant Haidar.
Twenty-two-year-old Amir was accused of being a militant associate. However, the families of all the three slain civilians have rejected the police version that their kin were involved in the militancy.
On Friday morning, Amir’s family met District Magistrate (DM) Ramban Mussarat Islam and submitted a written request for the return of Amir’s body.
In a letter dated 19 November 2021 reads, a copy of which is in the possession of The Kashmir Walla, with a subject line – request of handing over of body of late Amir Lateef who was killed in Hyderpora encounter on 17-11-20121 – has requested the concerned authorities to handover Amir’s body, “in the interest of justice.”
“The applicant want dead body of his son and want to bury him in his ancestral graveyard as per Muslim obligation,” the letter signed by Amir’s father, Muhammad Lateef Magray, reads.
Margay, a resident of Gool Tehsil in Ramban, in the letter said that his son was a “true nationalist” and he didn’t know why he was killed.
“That applicant gunned down one militant in the year 2005 and the then Governor decorated the applicant with a gold medal, sena medal. That after the applicant worked with security forces in an anti militancy operation,” the letter reads.
“The dead body of my son may kindly be handed over to me, so as to perform his last rites,” the letter reads.
Talking to The Kashmir Walla over the phone, Amir’s father Muhammad Lateef Magray that the family is optimistic that the government would listen to their pleas and return the body of their kin.
“DC sahib received our letter and forwarded it to the DC Srinagar infront of us. So, we have been told to wait for the reply of the letter,” said Magray.
“We are hopeful that after authorities have handed over the two bodies to their families, they will also hear our cries too. We also want to see our son one last time before giving him a proper burial,” he said.
Meanwhile, the DM Ramban Mussarat Islam said that he was busy in a “Covid meeting” and wouldn’t be able to comment on the issue.
Emotional scenes were witnessed on Friday morning at the house of the two civilians in Srinagar, after authorities succumbing to the families demand, handed over their bodies to the relatives for the proper burial.
The bodies of Muhammad Altaf Bhat and Mudasir Gul were returned to the families around 1 am on Friday amid forces presence after exhuming them from a graveyard in Handwara area of north Kashmir.
As reported earlier by The Kashmir Walla, according to the eyewitnesses account, Amir had spent half an hour in the nearby hospital after being frisked by the troops outside the building [that was later into a gunfight site].
The Jammu and Kashmir administration has called for a magisterial probe, headed by the Additional District Magistrate (ADM) Srinagar Khurshid Ahmad Shah, into the killings and asked for a report to be submitted within 15 days.
The families of Bhat and Gul held a protest on Wednesday at the press colony in Lal chowk demanding the bodies of their loved ones.
The police later briefly detained the families and released them later.
