Amid shutdown, mobile Internet snapped in Kashmir, restored later
Srinagar, Feb 11: Authorities on Tuesday snapped mobile Internet services in Kashmir as a precautionary measure to prevent any law and order disturbance on the 26th death anniversary of JKLF founder Mohammad Maqbool Bhat, officials said.
Mobile Internet services were suspended early in the morning as the authorities apprehended violence in the Valley in view of a shutdown call given by separatist outfits to mark Bhat’s death anniversary, they said.
The services were restored in the evening, the officials said.
Authorities had restored 2G Internet services in Kashmir on January 25, more than five months after snapping all communication facilities in the Valley following the nullification of Article 370 on August 05 last year.
The Internet services were suspended on Sunday as well as the separatists had called for a shutdown to mark the death anniversary of Parliament attack convict Mahammad Afzal Guru.
Police on Saturday lodged an FIR against the banned Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) for calling a strike on Guru’s death anniversary.
Guru was hanged in 2013 inside the Tihar jail in Delhi for his role in the Parliament attack in December 2001.
Bhat was hanged in 1984 and is buried inside the Tihar jail.
Meanwhile normal life in Kashmir was affected due to the strike.
Markets and business establishments remained closed while most of the public transport was off the roads, though some public transport was playing in civil lines area of the city where some roadside vendors also went about their routine business.
Security personnel were deployed in strength at “vulnerable places” in the city and elsewhere in the Valley to maintain law and order, the officials said.
There have been no reports of any untoward incident from anywhere in the Valley so far, they added.
