Daily Times

SRINAGAR: Indian occupation forces on Thursday martyred a Kashmiri freedom fighter who became a folk hero in the occupied territory after giving up geology research at Aligarh University to take up arms, officials said.

Manan Wani, 26, and an associate were martyred in a fierce gunfight that lasted more than 10 hours after Indian occupation forces were tipped off that he was hiding in a residential area, officials said on condition of anonymity.

“Wani’s family have identified the body and now legal formalities are underway,” one police officer said.

Another police officer said Wani and his associate escaped the first siege but became trapped in a village in the northern area of Handwara.

He rose to prominence after circulating two open letters in the Indian media explaining why he took up arms. “Deeply pained that we lost a budding intellectual and writer like him, fighting for the of cause of self-determination,” Mirwaiz Umar Farooq said in a tweet

The APHC called for a complete shutdown to pay homage to Wani, he added.

Published in Daily Times, September 12^th 2018.