Srinagar: After battling militants and street
protests for years, the police in snow-bound Kashmir Valley
has donned a different role, coming to the rescue of people
facing hardships on account of the heavy snowfall in the past
two days.
Police personnel in militancy-hit Sopore town of Baramulla
district repaired the house of a widow, while their colleagues
ferried four expecting women to hospitals in places of
Kashmir.
Heavy snowfall had damaged the house of Khatija, a widow
living in Krankshvan area of Sopore, leaving herself and her
family to fend for themselves in the freezing cold.
"A police team was sent to her house with building
material and her house was repaired on a war footing," a
police spokesman said.
Rahila, Hafiza and two others both named Saleema - all in
advanced pregnancy - were safely shifted to hospitals by the
police, he said.
Rahila, a resident of Gujjar Basti Batakote in Pahalgam
area of south Kashmir, was evacuated by police to the district
hospital in Anantnag in a police vehicle that was kept as a
standby for medical exigencies, the spokesman said.
He said the family was unable to shift her to hospital
because of heavy snowfall in the area.
In another incident, police in Khrew area of Pulwama
district shifted Hafiza Begum to sub-district hospital Pampore
as the road linking her village was not cleared of snow.
The other two would-be mothers - both named Saleema - were
shifted to hospital by police from Tekipora and Sogam areas of
north Kashmir Kupwara district.
"Police is assisting the civil administration in snow
clearance operation besides rendering all help to people
facing hardships due to heavy snowfall in the Valley," he
said.
On the directions of DIG South Kashmir SA Watali, an
ambulance has been kept on standby in each police station of
South Kashmir Range to shift any patient to the nearest
district headquarters, he said.
PTI
