SRINAGAR: As use of lethal pellet guns by Indian forces continues, the number of youth with ruptured and bruised eyes due to pellet wounds is rising with each passing day in Indian Occupied Kashmir (IOK).
On Friday, at least 20 youth were hit by the deadly pellets across the Kashmir Valley following clashes between protesters and forces’ personnel at different places, KMS reported on Saturday.
“We received 17 youth with pellet injuries to one of their eyes on Friday,” a senior doctor at SMHS hospital in Srinagar, which has been treating the eye injury cases for the past 70 days, told media men.
In total, the hospital, which has a full-fledged ophthalmology department, on Friday admitted 21 persons with pellet injuries to eyes and other parts of body.
The five youth who were admitted at the hospital on Thursday with pellet injuries to their eyes, were operated upon for removal of the pellets, the small metallic balls fired from pump shotguns with high velocity.
Since July 9, a day after the extrajudicial murder of noted freedom fighter, Burhan Muzaffar Wani, the SMHS hospital has admitted more than 820 persons with pellet injuries to one or both eyes.
The injured persons require undergoing weeks-long treatment including critical retinal surgeries to see any chances of regaining the vision in the damaged eyes.
Doctors have been however stating that most of the injured persons wouldn’t get back the vision to live a normal life.
Despite severe criticism over the use of the pellet guns, the Indian Government and its puppet authorities have allowed the continued use of the lethal weapon in the occupied territory.—APP
