APDP demands probe into Pulwama barber’s killing

Pulwama: While strongly condemning the abduction and murder of a barber Ghulam Mohammad Hajam, the Association of Parents of Disappeared Persons on Monday demanded that there must be an impartial enquiry into the matter and that the perpetrators behind the disappearance and subsequent killing of Hajam be brought to book.

The body of the disappeared barber was recovered from a riverside in Pulwama district on Sunday night.

Ghulam Mohammad Hajam (55) son of Ghulam Qadir Hajam, a barber from Tengpuna village of Pulwama went missing on January 3, 2016, and the family alleged that police arrested him during their action against the agitating people who have been demanding to erect a memorial, in memory of slain militants/civilians killed by the armed forces.

“Ghulam Mohammad disappeared from his shop. One of Hajam’s neighbouring shopkeepers, a baker, told the family that he had seen Hajam working in his shop on the morning of January 3. Thereafter, his family received information from some reliable source that Hajam was taken to Police Line Pulwama. On contacting the police, the family was told that a few boys were taken into custody and later released. However, Police denied the arrest of Hajam,” APDP said in a statement.

On January 17, 2016, the dead body of the disappeared Ghulam Mohammad Hajam was recovered from the banks of river Jehlum at Charoosa Awantipora, in Pulwama district.