Srinagar: International Forum for Justice Human Rights (IFJHR) JK chairman Mohammad Ahsan Untoo in a statement said that the victims of the worst kind of state terrorism of sopore 6 january 1993 are waiting for justice which is being denied by the biased legal system supported by an aggressive and fascist indian government.
The Sopore massacre which claimed national and international print and electronic media, more than 75 lives hundreds of shops and residential houses were burned is glaring example of a planned genocide by occupational forces which the world and human rights organizations should take note of and act according to their conscience ,
On January 6 1993, the Indian Border Security Force (BSF) personals as per different media reports killed 75 civilians and burnt Sopore market, also known as Chota London (Little London). The massacre is seen as one of the worst massacres Indian forces carried out in Kashmir’s history.
Eyewitnesses recall that fateful day; it was a chilly morning of 6th January 1993. Around 9:30 am, a small group of 3-4 militants attacked a platoon of Border Security Force (BSF) at Baba Yousuf lane resulting in killing of one of their troopers.
It was at the very moment the BSF troopers went berserk. The common people had to pay for it. What followed was the biggest massacre of innocent people that Kashmir witnessed since 1990, when the armed rebellion against India broke out in Kashmir.
At around 9:55 am, just half an hour after the firing incident, the BSF unit of 94 Battalion stationed some five kilometers away from the Baba Yousuf Lane where the firing incident happened, came out of their barracks and resorted to indiscriminate firing upon the people in the most inhumane manner.
The BSF jawans later sprinkled the gun powder on the entire Sopore market and set it ablaze. As per figures from different sources, around 120 houses and 350 shops, including Women’s Degree College and famous Samad talkies, were gutted in the firestorm.
A group of firefighters told media that “We were held on gunpoint and not allowed to go further. We had to wait for 3 hours to start rescue operations. The troopers left no stone unturned to ensure that maximum numbers of civilians are killed.”
Eyewitnesses added that the BSF men fired upon SRTC bus, which was on the way from Sopore to Bandipora. “They (BSF men) set ablaze the bus. The worst part was that no passenger was allowed to come out the ill-fated vehicle.
Twenty-fivepersons were charred to death. They also fired upon the father and son who were loading goods on a truck,” the survivors of the massacre recall.
“I cannot forget the incident when a BSF man snatched a little baby from her mother’s lap and threw her into the flames and when the mother begged for her baby, she also was shot dead. This incident will haunt me till I am alive”, says an eyewitness, who survived this heinous massacre.
Following the registration of FIRs, the investigations on 23 January, 1993, was handed over to CBI.
After the massacre, government also set up a one-man commission of inquiry on 30 January 1993 comprising of Justice Amarjeet Choudhary.
Between 30 January 1993 and 30 April 1994, the commission visited Jammu and Kashmir only once.
India’s top investigation agency Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) took 20 long years to investigate the case. On 17 July, 2013, two separate closure reports were filed by CBI before the Hon’ble court of Chief Judicial Magistrate, Srinagar. But the report was not made public by the CBI.
On 1 April, 2012, Ahsan Untoo filed a petition bearing number SHRC/111/Sopore/2012, seeking investigation into the Sopore Massacre. Web Desk
