Jehangir Ali 
Srinagar: Before leaving his home in Goripora village of Sopore police district in north Kashmir on Wednesday evening (February 5), Waseem Ahmad Mir, 27, a young truck driver, promised his mother Nisara Begum that he would take her to a good doctor after returning from Kolkata.
Since the onset of winter in Kashmir this year, Begum had been complaining of loss of strength in her legs. “As the eldest son of the family, he used to take care of his parents,” said Rashid Rasheed, his cousin.
On Thursday morning, security forces set up barricades around the village of Goripora to ensure a quiet funeral for Mir, who was shot dead by the army in Sangrama area on the Srinagar-Baramulla highway on Wednesday night after his truck allegedly jumped a security checkpoint.
Speaking with The Wire, Rasheed said that Mir had made a brief visit to home on Wednesday evening after loading his truck with about 800 boxes of Kashmiri apples in Sopore, the apple town of Kashmir.
The ill-fated truck was on the way to Srinagar where Mir was scheduled to pick up its owner, whose identity could not be immediately ascertained, before starting the long journey to Kolkata to deliver the consignment of apples. The shootout took place at around 10:30 pm on Wednesday.
According to Rasheed, the family got a phone call at midnight on Wednesday from the truck owner, who had been contacted by local police, informing them that Mir had met an “accident” on Srinagar-Baramulla highway and that he had been taken to Government Medical College in Baramulla in a critical condition.
In a tragic turn of events, when the family arrived at the hospital, they learnt that Mir had been killed in firing allegedly by the army. “They even delayed handing over his body for more than 12 hours under the pretext of postmortem examination. We had to wait at the hospital till the afternoon on the next day,” said Rasheed.
A woman breaks down outside the residence of Wasim Ahmad Mir in Goripora village of Sopore. Photo: Sajad Hameed
In a statement, the army said that the truck, which was driven by Mir, jumped a security checkpoint, triggering a chase for about 23 km from Sopore during which the soldiers fired gunshots at the tyres which “forced (the) vehicle to halt at Sangrama Chowk” on Srinagar-Baramulla highway.
Rasheed, however, said that “dozens of bullets” had been fired “all over the truck”. “There are dozens of CCTV cameras along the route. They (army) should share the footage with us,” he said, demanding an impartial inquiry into the killing.
Mir was the lone bread-earner of his family which includes his father Abdul Majeed Mir, who works partly as a mason, mother who is a housewife, two younger brothers – Shafqat Majeed and Irfan Majeed who work as salesman at a garments store in Sopore and housekeeping supervisor in a hotel respectively, and a younger sister who is jobless.
“His death has inflicted a cruel blow to his family. The government should identify the perpetrators and hold them accountable for killing an innocent person. Ask anyone in the village and they will tell you that he was a noble person. His death is an injustice not just for his family but for the entire Kashmir,” said Rasheed.
As the news of the tragic killing spread in the village on Thursday morning, hundreds of women gathered at the dilapidated, single-storied house of the aggrieved family in Goripora to express their condolences.
Dozens of women gathered outside the Goripora residence to express condolences with the aggrieved family who lost their lone bread earner in Baramulla shooting. Photo: Sajad Hameed
Witnesses said that Mir’s inconsolable mother beat her chest and wept relentlessly over the tragic fate of her son while other women tried to console her, asking her to show patience. “Who will now take care of us, my son? Who will take me to the doctor now? Why didn’t you take me along with you?” Begum cried.
Witnesses said that mourners were angry over the alleged delay by the authorities in handing over the slain youngster’s body to his family for burial.
“What has he done that his body is not being returned? He was killed by the army and now they aren’t allowing us to even see him for the last time. One would understand it if he had been a militant. He was innocent and a daily wage earner,” a woman, who could not be immediately identified, said on Thursday morning outside the aggrieved family’s house.
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Security forces had thrown a cordon around the village and some journalists were allegedly stopped from reporting the story.
“I was taking pictures when a man in civvies pulled me aside and asked me to leave, saying that he had orders from higher-ups in the police,” said a journalist, who works with an international wire agency, wishing to stay anonymous.
The Wire tried to reach senior police officials of Sopore police district over the issue. The story will be updated if and when a response is received.
Later on Thursday afternoon, Mir’s body was handed to the family after which he was laid to rest amid emotional scenes at the common graveyard of Goripora village.