Two government school teachers, including a woman, were shot dead inside a government school by militants at the Sangam Eidgah area of Srinagar in Jammu & Kashmir on Thursday, 7 October, the police said, as per multiple reports.
This comes just two days after three people, including a famous Kashmiri business person, were killed by suspected militants in a series of attacks within two hours. Overall, seven civilians have been killed in J&K in the last 10 days, reported The Hindu.
According to NDTV, Deepak Chand, a Hindu from Jammu, was a teacher at the school, while the other deceased, Supunder Kour, a Sikh, was the principal. Since classes were still being conducted online, there were no students in the school.
"At about 11:15 am, terrorists shot dead two school teachers at Sangam Eidgah in Srinagar district," a police official said, adding that the police had cordoned off the area and were looking for the attackers, reported PTI. As per The Hindu, the police were conducting an investigation "to establish the sequence of events".
"These recent incidents of targeting civilians are to create an atmosphere of fear, communal disharmony here. This is a conspiracy to target the local ethos & defame local Kashmiri Muslims. This is being done on instructions from agencies in Pak."Jammu and Kashmir Director General of Police Dilbag Singh was quoted as saying by ANI
The Hindu's report identified the victims as Satinder Kaur and Deepak Chand, both residents of Allocha Bagh in Srinagar.
Dilbag Singh said the terror outfit, The Resistance Front (TRF), was behind the attack.
"TRF is run from Karachi. We will soon expose this nexus from across (the border). The victims were not affiliated with any group. It's a malicious propaganda by TRF that Bindroo was working with the RSS," Dilbag Singh told NDTV.
The police said that the gunmen barged into the Sangam Higher Secondary School near Safa Kadal in the old city and fired at the two teachers from a point-blank range, as per the daily.
"Both the teachers were declared brought dead at a nearby hospital," officials said.
National Conference leader and former Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah took to social media to condemn the latest killings.
"Shocking news coming in again from Srinagar. Another set of targeted killings, this time of two teachers in a Govt school in Idgah area of the city. Words of condemnation are not enough for this inhuman act of terror but I pray for the souls of the deceased to rest in peace," he tweeted.
On Tuesday, suspected militants had killed Makhan Lal Bindroo outside his shop, Bindroo Health Zone, in Srinagar. Bindroo also owned Bindroo Chemists, set up by his family in 1947 in Srinagar. A street food vendor, who hailed from Bihar, and a taxi stand association president in Bandipora were also killed in the attacks.
(With inputs from PTI, NDTV and The Hindu.)
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