Police fired teargas shells and used batons to disperse the processionists, who had assembled at Abi Guzar and tried to take out a procession, despite imposition of prohibitory orders on the city, official sources said.Muharram processions were banned since the eruption of militancy in the Valley in 1989.

Beating their chests and raising slogans to mourn the martyrdom of grand son of Prophet Mohammad, Hazrat Imam Hussain, supporters of J and K Ittehadul Muslimeen, led by its chairman and senior executive member of Hurriyat Conference, Moulvi Abbass Ansari, tried to proceed towards Dalgate, the sources said.

They said the processionists were stopped by the police at Regal Chowk, which sparked off clashes between the police and theprocessionists.Police fired dozens of teargas shells and used batons to chase away the processionists. However, as they regrouped, police arrested 36 of them, the sources said.

All the arrested, including Moulvi Abbass Ansari, Javid Ahmad Mir, Shahidul Islam of Hurriyat Conference, were lodged in a police station in Kothibagh, sources said, adding they were taken into preventive custody.

Moulvi Abbass Ansari, a senior Shi'ite Muslim leader, had announced recently that the traditional `tazia procession' would be taken out as usual from Guru Bazar to Dalgate, notwithstanding the ban imposed by district authorities on assembly of four or more persons under Section 144 Cr PC.Police assisted by paramilitary forces foiled the attempt of the senior separatist leader to take out a procession from Guru Bazar in downtown Srinagar.

Meanwhile, reports of taking out small Muharram processions have been received from Dalgate, Zadibal and Hassanabad in capital Srinagar, Badgam, Magam, Pattan and other Shhi'itedominated areas besides Imambara Bemina, sources said.