Thousands of people have been detained in Kashmir over th fear of outbreaks of unrest after the BJP govt stripped of the special status to the State 2 weeks ago.
A magistrate speaking to AFP on condition of anonymity said at least 4,000 people were arrested and held under the Public Safety Act (PSA), a controversial law that allows authorities to imprison someone for up to two years without charge or trial.
“Most of them were flown out of Kashmir because prisons here have run out of capacity,” the magistrate said, adding that he had used a satellite phone allocated to him to collate the figures from colleagues across the State amid a communications blackout imposed by authorities.
Government spokesman Rohit Kansal said previously there was “no centralised figure” for the total number of people detained. But AFP spoke to numerous government officials in Srinagar, including police and security personnel, who confirmed the sweeping arrests. A police official who asked to remain anonymous told AFP “around 6,000 people were medically examined at a couple of places in Srinagar after they were detained”. He added: “They are first sent to the central jail in Srinagar and later flown out of here in military aircraft.”
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