Excelsior Correspondent
MENDHAR, Sept 1: The people residing on that side of the fencing at village Ramlutta and Baryani Gali of Balakote lodged strong protest today after members of marriage party including bride and bridegroom were detained by the troops at the fencing gate for over three hours.
Reports said that a Barat of one Mohd Razzak, son of Izmatullah of Ramlutta village on that side of the fencing in our territory, had gone to Mangalnad in Rajouri on Tuesday. The marriage party crossed fencing gate after frisking by the Army troops at Baryani Gali at around 11 am on Monday. The Barat returned and reached fencing gate at around 4 pm. But the soldiers on duty allegedly detained them all for about three hours. They conducted frisking of bride and her box containing her clothes and jewellery in the absence of female security personnel which annoyed the baratis. There was a little argument with the Army men of some elderly baratis over this matter and the troops detained all the `baratis’ for over three hours.
Later, village Sarpanch and Numberdar took up the matter with the SDPO Mendhar and SDM who spoke to the senior officers in the unit and the `barat’ was allowed to cross fencing gate at around 7 pm.
Today, a large number of villagers including women lodged their protest with the senior Army officials and civil officers. A joint meeting was held in presence of villagers with CO of the unit, SDPO, Tehsildar and SHO this afternoon. The CO and 2 IC of the unit apologized to the villagers for the behavior of jawans.
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