SRINAGAR - About 40 people were injured in day-long clashes between irate mobs and riot police at several places in the walled city of Jammu and at Muthi, Diogyana and Vijay Pur on the outskirts of the winter capital of restive Jammu and Kashmir yesterday. The injured included a dozen policemen some of whom, witnesses and officials said, were seized by unruly crowds and then thrashed severely at Muthi and other places. One of the victims was so badly injured in the assault that he had to be admitted to Intensive Care Unit of a local hospital, officials claimed.The attacks on policemen came a day after Shri Amarnath Sangharsh Samiti, a conglomerate of Jammu-based political, religious and social parties and groups, publicly accused the law enforcement agencies particularly the local police of inflicting excesses on its activists and supporters during the ongoing agitation seeking allotment of about 40 hectares of forestland in the Kashmir Valley to the Shri Amarnathji Shrine Board (SASB).
Police fired teargas canisters and used batons to take on the stone-pelting mobs at various places yesterday. Elite anti-riot Rapid Action Force (RAF) also stepped in to contain the situation. The Jammu and Kashmir government had, for the first time in the state's troubled history, requisitioned several companies of the RAP from Delhi recently to meet with the deteriorating law and order situation over the Amarnath land row.