SIA reopens probe into Wandhama killing of 23 Kashmiri Pandits: Report

The Jammu and Kashmir State Investigation Agency (SIA) has reopened the investigation into the 1998 Wandhama massacre, nearly three decades after 23 Kashmiri Pandits were killed in Ganderbal district. The move comes as the agency steps up its probe into several high-profile terror cases and targeted killings from the peak of militancy in the Valley that have remained unsolved for decades.

The SIA is now trying to establish the role of terrorists, underground networks and over-ground workers (OGWs) allegedly involved in the attacks. According to India Today, the agency recently conducted raids at several locations in the Kashmir Valley in connection with the Wandhama massacre and the killing of Kashmiri Pandit leader Tika Lal Taploo.

Wandhama massacre

On January 25, 1998, heavily armed terrorists entered the homes of Kashmiri Pandit families in Wandhama village and killed 23 people, including nine women and four children. The killings took place on the eve of Republic Day and during Shab-e-Qadr, one of the holiest nights of Ramzan.

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The renewed probe is part of the SIA’s wider effort to revisit old militancy-era cases and identify those involved in attacks that had remained unsolved.

Taploo, Ganjoo cases

The agency has also intensified its investigation into the killing of Taploo and the assassination of Justice Neelkanth Ganjoo.

Taploo, a prominent lawyer and then Jammu and Kashmir BJP vice-president, was shot dead near his residence in Srinagar in September 1989. His killing was among the early targeted assassinations of prominent Kashmiri Pandits during the rise of militancy in the Valley.

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Justice Ganjoo, who had sentenced JKLF terrorist Maqbool Bhat to death, was shot dead by suspected JKLF terrorists at Hari Singh Street in Srinagar on November 4, 1989.

Renewed focus

The latest move follows the SIA’s reopening of investigations into other prominent killings, including those of Kashmiri Pandit nurse Sarla Bhat and writer Sarwanand Koul Premi and his son Virender Koul.

In June, the agency filed a 737-page chargesheet in the 1990 murder of Sarla Bhat, naming jailed JKLF chief Yasin Malik as the alleged mastermind. In August, the SIA conducted searches at nine locations in Jammu and Kashmir in connection with the killing of Premi and his son.