Any unfamiliar face that shows up in Mela, a predominantly Hindu village with a population of just over 2,500 people, in Jammu’s Kathua district, around 118 km south-east of Jammu city, is greeted with blank stares and wary suspicion from the locals gathered in small groups outside shops, houses and a shuttered temple.

Yet, upon hearing Amarjeet Sharma’s name, villagers quickly begin to recount stories of the ‘Doctor’s’ kind and helpful nature and the horror they experienced on 9 June 2024.

Amarjeet Sharma, a 49-year-old chemist known as ‘Doctor’ by the locals, had a straightforward routine for over three decades. Each night around 10 PM, he would leave his house—at the edge of Mela’s forest area—walk a couple of hundred metres into the woods to check on his grazing cattle and return home within 10 minutes.

On 9 June, after returning late from his shop, the only pharmacy in the village, Sharma went about his routine as usual.

“He changed his clothes as soon as he got home and headed straight to the forest,” said Manju Sharma, his wife. “We were supposed to have dinner after he returned.”

But that night, Sharma did not return.

“After about 15 minutes, I called him three times, but there was no answer,” said Manju Sharma, a soft-spoken 45-year-old. “I then went to check at my in-law’s place, but he wasn’t there either. After that, our family and some neighbours quickly went out to search for him.”

As the search extended into the forested area, Sharma’s 20-year-old son, Abhishek, found his father’s phone at the edge of the narrow road that leads into the forest.

A few metres away, the search party came across Sharma lying face down in the bushes.

“At first, we thought he had fallen ill and fainted,” Manju Sharma said. “But when we turned him over, he was dead. His throat was slashed.”




Sources - https://article-14.com/post/five-years-after-370-abrogation-jammu-s-rising-militancy-leaves-behind-a-trail-of-fear-panic-and-shattered-lives-66b589702af85