After police, they went to saints for their missing son

IN the Kashmir's missing saga, this is the latest addition. When 24-year-old Maqsood Ahmad Bader went missing on May 10, his parents didn't rely solely on the police. But as in most of the cases, the J-K police have failed to trace the missing persons, this family turned to saints for a clue about their missing son.

Maqsood's missing story is only one month old. On May 9, Bader left his rented accommodation at Rajbagh Srinagar for his native village Zalangam, Kokernag -- the native village of Abdul Rehman Padder, whose disappearance and subsequent killing in a fake encounter exposed the "vicious network of police officers" involved in civilian killings for cash and medals.

Maqsood didn't board the Kokernag bus instead he took the Kulgam bus to meet his aunt. He stayed there for a night and boarded the bus next morning for his native village. Since then, more than a month has passed, but Maqsood has not reached his home.

The family's search for the missing son belied the claims of state place. "I went to Kokernag police station to register an FIR, but they refused and asked me to go to the Koimoh police station in Kulgam," says the 65-year-old father of Maqsood, Mohammad Akram Bader. "I travelled to Koimoh police station, but they too refused and asked me register the FIR at Rajbagh police station. It was six days after Maqsood went missing that the Rajbagh police station finally agreed to register the FIR," Akram says.

For the past month, the family have travelled to every part of the Valley and visited every police station to trace him, but without a success so far. "We even went to Uri near the Line of Control (LoC) to look for him," says Akram as he breaks down. "But the police didn't cooperate," he adds.

... contd.

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