No rush of minority community at Srinagar airport, says officials
Airport authorities in Srinagar on Thursday denied any unusual increase in passenger footfall amid fears that non-locals and Kashmiri Pandit employees were rushing to leave the Union Territory hours after terrorists shot dead a bank employee from Rajasthan in Kashmir’s Kulgam district.
“We strongly rebut the sensational rumour-mongering. We handle between 16,000 to 18,000 passengers every day. Today also the number of passengers is average. There is no heavy rush of the minority community,” the official Twitter handle of the Srinagar Airport posted.
The brazen killing of the bank employee inside the bank premises on Thursday was the eight such killing in the Valley since May 1 and the third of a non-Muslim government employee.
Vijay Kumar, a manager with the Ellaqui Dehati Bank at Areh Mohanpora branch in the south Kashmir district, received grievous gunshot injuries and died on his way to hospital.
The latest killing led to a chorus of condemnation from political parties across the spectrum, including the National Conference and the BJP. Kumar, a resident of Hanumangarh in Rajasthan, had joined the Kulgam branch only a week ago. He had earlier been working in the Kokernag branch of the bank, co-owned by the central government, the Jammu and Kashmir administration and the State Bank of India.
