• Relatives of the five missing men came out on streets and protests intensified across Anantnag forcing the government to order a judicial enquiry.

• On April 3, 2000, the protesters marched towards the Deputy Commissioner’s office. Ten of them were killed in police firing, including relatives of the missing men.

• Under pressure, the Farooq Abdullah government suspended Anantnag’s Senior Superintendent of Police Farooq Khan and an SHO besides ordering exhumation of the bodies and subsequent DNA test to ascertain their identities.

• On April 6, a team of forensic experts from Government Medical College, Srinagar, exhumed the bodies to take samples for DNA tests. The men were buried in graveyards at Vuzkhah, Sumlam and Chogamm villages, which were miles apart. * Anantnag Police exonerated Mohammad Yousuf Wagay alias Chatti Guuafter months of investigation. Wagay was the man shown as the link between the Chittisinghpora massacre and the Panchalthan encounter by no other than Union Home Secretary Kamal Pande. Wagay, a milkman from Chittisinghpora, had been arrested immediately after the massacre and was accused of being the local helper of the “foreign militants” who killed the Sikhs. Wagay was interviewed by The Indian Express in jail on November 19, 2000. He was then in preventive custody after his father had requested the police

to keep him behind bars for his safety.

• On April, 9, 2001, Deputy Commissioner of Anantnag quoting the report submitted by the police’s Special Investigating Team admitted that the five men were innocent and ordered Rs 1 lakh as ex gratia relief.

... contd.