KL NEWS NETWORK
SRINAGAR
Police Sunday detained and thrashed a reporter of alocal English daily while he was covering protests in North Kashmir’s Bandipora district.
Owais Farooqi, a reporter who works for a Srinagar based English daily – Kashmir Reader – said that he was detained by police when he was performing his professional duties in Gulshan Chowk in the district where protests were held against the killing of Gowhar Ahmad Dar, who was killed on Saturday in Srinagar outskirts here.
“Police thrashed me despite revealing my identity to them. Police were chasing protesters and they held me even though I told them I am a reporter,” he said, adding the police detained him in police station and kept him there.
Senior Superintendent of Police Bandipora Shabir Choudary told KNS, “it was a mistake by police to detain the reporter.”
“Police were chasing protesters at the spot and they mistook the reporter as a protestor. He carried neither a camera nor an identity card. He was wearing Pheran. But when he told the police in police station that he was a reporter, he was released,” the SSP said, refuting that police beat up the reporter.
