Kashmir
‘Cut my hair but don’t spray me’, Nowgam victim pleaded to Choti Cutters
Srinagar: In yet another braid-chopping incident, a woman from Nowgam area of Srinagar has become the latest victim.
The area which lies on the outskirts of Srinagar, the summer capital of the Jammu and Kashmir, erupted in massive protests as panic-stricken locals took to the street in protest against the attack.
Narrating her ordeal, the victim (identity withheld) told FreePressKashmir, “I was all alone in my house when they (braid choppers) came. They were two in number and were wearing masks. One stood at the threshold of the room while the other came inside.”
The fear stricken 25-year-old housewife and a mother of a five year old girl, was talking in a subdued state with relatives and neighbors gathered around her.
While laying under the quilt, the victim added in a shaking voice, “They tried to spray something on my face but I begged them not to do so. They then warned me to not raise any hue and cry otherwise they will kill me.”
The two attackers, whom the eye-witnesses are alleging to be non-locals, then proceeded to chop off the woman’s braid and eventually flee the spot.
Soon after the incident the locals, mostly women, poured into the streets to protest against the attack. They vociferously protested against the unabated braid-chopping incidents in the Valley and against the inaction of the police and the administration alike.
The woman’s husband, a tailor by profession, told FreePressKashmir in a lamented voice, “I had gone to see off my daughter to school. Once I returned, I came to know about this incident.”
Several girls and women in parts of the Valley have complained over the past month of their hair being mysteriously cut. They told the police that unknown persons cut their hair after using some spray to make them unconscious.
The Jammu and Kashmir Police on Sunday doubled the reward to Rs 6 lakh for information on the incidents of braid chopping in the Valley. Two more such incidents were also reported from Chadoora area in Budgam district on Saturday.
Recently, the state police had formed special investigation teams in every district of the Valley to investigate braid-chopping incidents.
However, with no clues to work with, the police has failed to catch any lead in the case.
