Kashmir: Plastic bullets for crowd control, pellet guns 'last resort'

For the first time ever, plastic bullets will be used by security forces in Kashmir Valley to control raucous and violent crowds.

The Ministry of Home Affairs has asked the security forces to use plastic bullets against the stone-pelters in the Valley and pellet guns to be used only as a last resort, sources state.

In the last hearing, the apex court had asked the Centre to consider effective means other than use of pellet guns to quell stone pelting mobs in Jammu and Kashmir as it concerns life and death.

The Kashmir High Court Bar Association (KHBA) had earlier alleged that the pellet guns are being 'misused'.

Earlier, the apex court had then expressed concern over the injuries suffered by hundreds, several of them minors, during the protests in Kashmir last year following the encounter that killed Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani.

"We are of the impression that there are other methods that can be adopted [to quell protests]," the bench headed by Chief Justice JS Khehar had told the Centre.