Scuffle over tricolour hoisting in Srinagar

Amid high alert in Srinagar on the eve of Independence Day, a scuffle broke out between locals and a group of non-Kashmiri residents when the latter attempted to hoist the national flag near city centre Lal Chowk here on Tuesday.

Reports and eyewitnesses said as soon as the group of five to six persons tried to unfurl the national flag at Lal Chowk, people present there stopped them and a minor scuffle broke out.

However, the police reached the spot and detained the persons.

Superintendent of Police (Srinagar East) Dawood Ayoub while confirming the incident said a police team rescued the persons who had come to unfurl the flag.

It was not immediately known who the people were. Police Station Maisuma has taken cognizance of the incident and registered an FIR.

This is not the first time that such an incident has taken place at the historic Lal Chowk.

Last year, around a dozen activists of the right-wing Shiv Sena tried to hoist the tricolour at the clock tower but were detained by the police.

In 1992, when militancy was at its peak in Kashmir, the then BJP president Murli Manohar Joshi, who was accompanied by some party colleagues, unfurled the tricolour at the historic place on the occasion of Republic Day.

Meanwhile, security across Kashmir was beefed up to thwart any possible strikes by the militants during Independence Day functions.

In Srinagar, the police and paramilitary forces are maintaining an extra vigil in the wake of escape of militants from a hide-out at Batamaloo.