SRINAGAR - Indian forces killed a Kashmir militant leader who became a folk hero in the
troubled territory after giving up geology research at an Indian university to
become a militant, officials said.
Manan Wani, 26, and an
associate were killed in a fierce gunfight that lasted more than 10 hours after
security forces were tipped off that he was hiding in a residential area,
officials told AFP on condition of anonymity.
"Wani's family have identified
the body and now legal formalities are underway," one police officer said.
Another police officer said
Wani and his associate escaped a first siege but became trapped in a village in
the northern area of Handwara, where they were killed.
Wani quit a PhD programme at
Aligarh University in January to join Hizbul Mujahideen, the biggest group
fighting for Kashmir 's merger with Pakistan.
He rose to prominence after
circulating two open letters in the Indian media explaining why he took up arms.
"We are soldiers we don´t
fight to die, but to win, we don´t feel dignity in death but we do feel dignity
in fighting (Indian)- occupation, its military might, its oppression, its
tyranny, its collaborators and most of all its ego," Manan Wani wrote in
his first letter in July.
The scholar-turned-rebel died
not far from his home in the densely militarised frontier area of Kupwara.
The killing of another
popular rebel leader Burhan Wani -- no relation -- by security forces in July
2016 sparked fierce protests in Indian Kashmir that left more than 100 dead.
Top separatist leaders
opposed to India's rule in Kashmir called for a general strike on Friday over
Wani's killing.
"Deeply pained that we lost a
budding intellectual and writer like him, fighting for the of cause of
self-determination," Mirwaiz Umar Farooq one of the three top separatist
leaders of the Joint Resistance Leadership said in a tweet
The JRL called for a complete
shutdown "to pay homage" to Wani, he added.
Since 1989, Hizbul Mujahideen
and other groups have been fighting hundreds of thousands of Indian soldiers
deployed in the territory that is divided between India and Pakistan and
claimed in full by the arch rivals.
Tens of thousands, mostly
civilians, have died in the fighting between separatist rebels and government
forces.
This year at least 180
militants, 60 civilians and 74 security forces have been killed in dozens of
clashes.
- APP/AFP
