They threatened to kill us, kept slapping to keep us quiet: 4-yr-old survivor

A day of gunfire and trauma came to an end with six bodies being taken out of Billu Ram Bhagat’s yellow two-storey house on the outskirts of Jammu some time before midnight. Three of the dead were killers of the other three — Billu’s tenant and his children’s tutor Ashok Kumar, the family’s neighbour Sandeep Singh Chib, and Military Intelligence Jawan Sham Murari who had followed the militants to the house.

The children, who could barely speak from the shock as they were rescued, began to tell the tale of their horror on Thursday afternoon.

“It was very, very scary... we were locked inside a room and the men holding guns said that they will kill us if we wept,” said 9-year-old Sheetal, eldest of the children, standing by her mother’s bed in hospital. “When Vipan, my three-year-old brother cried out in terror, they warned my mother and me to keep him quiet or they would shoot.” Billu’s wife Sunita Devi was hit by a bullet in the exchange of fire.

Billu hugged Kajal tightly, saying, “I had lost all hope. My family has come out of the jaws of death.” Tears rolling down his face, the father who was not in the house when the militants entered, whispered, “God and the army have given us a second life today.” Billu’s brother Tarsem Kumar Bhagat—who was held hostage along with his wife Rita Dev—and the brothers’ mother Biro Devi, 70, haltingly described how the terrorists entered their home, and what happened afterward.

“I was milking the cow when the three men entered. I first thought they were policemen looking for some suspects,” Biro said. Tarsem added: “It was around 6 am. I ran towards the room on the first floor where the children were sleeping.”

Tarsem was the only man among the three present in the house who survived. The first to die was Jawan Sham Murari, who appeared at a door soon after the militants had taken over the house.

... contd.