Amid heavy flow of transport, shutdown in Valley continued on Wednesday amid a stone-throwing incident at Tahab village of Pulwama district while joint resistance leadership extended the strike till December 8 in its fresh protest calendar.Witnesses said civil lines and uptown areas of Srinagar witnessed increased movement of private as well as public transport today while vendors, who have set up their stalls across Lal Chowk and adjoining areas, continue to attract customers. The passenger mini-buses, cabs and auto-rickshaws were plying normally all across the uptown and civil lines areas.Though there was very less movement of public transport in downtown areas falling under five police station areas, but the private transport and auto-rickshaws were plying normally and there was no disruption at any place. However, the deployments of government forces including police and CRPF continue to be in place in downtown areas. No incident of stone-pelting was reported from old city.The cabs and buses plying on inter-district routes were operating normally to and fro Batamaloo. Reports from other districts of valley including Pulwama, Baramulla and Kulgam said there was increased movement of private and public transport and the cabs were also plying normally. In Srinagar and elsewhere, some shops were seen before 4 pm, when there were no relaxation hours, and customers were also thronging these shops.
At Tahab village of Pulwama, massive stone-throwing clashes erupted post-freedom rally on call of joint resistance leadership. Locals said the rally concluded peacefully and hundreds attended it. However, they alleged, police and CRPF intercepted the rally participants when they were on-way to their respective homes. This infuriated the people and they resorted to stone-pelting on forces men.The reports said that there were heavy clashes between the forces and youths and four protesters were injured in these clashes. Police burst teargas canisters to disperse the protesters. However, the protesters didn’t budge and they continued stone-pelting on forces which continued for several hours.In the meanwhile, the joint resistance leadership, as part of the ongoing mass uprising, extended shutdown till December 8. According to the protest calendar, there would be shutdown without relaxation on Friday, Monday and Tuesday. On Saturday and Sunday, there is no shutdown call and on Wednesday and Thursday, there would be shutdown but only upto 4pm. The joint resistance leadership has called on people to march towards Lal Chowk on Monday. (GNS)