Tribune News Service

Srinagar, July 11

The Indian Army ‘broke protocol’ along Line of Control and handed over the body of a child to Pakistan after he had fallen into a river.

The body of a seven-year-old boy was retrieved from Kishanganga River in north-western part of Jammu and Kashmir by Indian Army troops in Gurez sector yesterday.

Pakistan was informed over the hotline.

On humanitarian grounds, Army offered to hand over body at Gurez itself, instead at one of the established meeting points.

Abid Sheikh, who had drowned in the Kishenganga river on the Pakistan side of the Line of Control (LoC), was handed over to Pakistan authorities at Dudgai post in Chorwan area of the LoC at 2 pm, police said.

“The body was handed over by district officials, police and the Army to Pakistan Army,” police said.

The body of the boy, who belonged to Astor district of Gilgit-Baltistan in Pakistan, was pulled out on Wednesday from the river in Gurez area of Bandipora district. — With agency inputs