Srinagar: Normal life across the Kashmir Valley was affected Monday because of a shutdown called by separatists to protest a court judgment.
Last week, the state high court ruled that "life imprisonment meant imprisonment for life" while disposing of a petition by a senior separatist leader, Qasim Faktoo, who had pleaded for release since he had already completed 14 years in jail after being sentenced for life by a trial court.
Monday`s strike call went out from hardline separatist leader Syed Ali Geelani and the pro-independence Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF).
Shops were shut and public transport stayed off the roads in capital Srinagar and other towns.
Only private vehicles and some three-wheelers could be seen on uptown roads in Srinagar.
Vehicles carrying tourists to north and south Kashmir hill stations of Sonamarg and Gulmarg also moved normally.
Authorities have made elaborate security arrangements in Srinagar and other towns to maintain law and order.
Attendance in government offices was thin, while schools in capital Srinagar are shut because of the strike.
IANS
