Srinagar, February 13, 2023 (PPI-OT):In Indian illegally occupied Jammu and Kashmir, the district court of Kupwara on Monday rejected the bail application of five Indian army personnel and four civilians who were arrested last month for running a narcotics racket in Kupwara. Rejecting the bail application, the court of the additional district and session’s judge, Kupwara, ruled that the army personnel “who are protectors of the society became perpetrators…in the illegal sale and procurement of drugs” and their custodial investigation was necessary to arrest other suspected members of the gang.

Citing a 2022 judgement of the Indian Supreme Court and two judgements of Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh high courts, the court, while turning down the bail application, ruled that the “menace of drugs is on [the] increase” in Kashmir and “main sufferer of this menace is younger generation of society [who are] being put on the peril of destruction”. The army personnel have been identified as Naib Subedar Puran Singh and driver Anil Kumar, both residents of Reasi in Jammu, Sepoy Sushil Kumar, a resident of Jammu’s Samba district, and Naiks Waseem Ahmad Mir, Muhammad Shafiq Khan and Ishfaq Ahmad Tanoli.

All of them are posted in the 175 Engineering (Territorial Army) Wing headquartered in Panzgam area of Kupwara. Four civilians, who have been arrested in the case, are Army porter Mashkoor Sheikh, Mohammad Yousaf Kothari and Saleem Sheikh, all residents of Kupwara, and Mohammad Imran Teli, a resident of Bandipora district in north Kashmir.

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