JK: Security beefed amid separatists march to pay tributes to slain Hurriyat leaders

Restrictions were Tuesday imposed in parts of the summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir in view of the separatists' plan to hold a march to Eidgah martyrs graveyard for paying tributes to slain Hurriyat leaders Mirwaiz Mohammad Farooq and Abdul Gani Lone. The district administration imposed restrictions in Khanyar, Rainawari, Nowhatta, Maharajgunj and Safa Kadal police station areas of the old city, officials said.

They said security force personnel were deployed in large numbers at vulnerable places in the city and elsewhere in the valley for maintaining law and order. The separatists had called for a shut down in Kashmir and asked people to march to Edgar martyrs graveyard to mark the death anniversaries of the slain Mirwaiz and Lone.

However, authorities placed Mirwaiz Umar Farooq under house arrest. Mirwaiz Mohammad Farooq was killed by militants on this day in 1990 and Abdul Gani Lone, the father of former minister Sajad Lone and Hurriyat executive member Bilal Lone, fell to the bullets of militants during a commemoration function for the slain Mirwaiz in 2002.

Elsewhere, normal life was affected across the valley due to the strike called by the separatists. Business establishments, schools, colleges and other educational institutions remained closed while public transport was off the roads in most parts of the valley.