Hamid Gada

rdf:langString Hamid Gada

rdf:langString Shiekhpora village, Badgam, Jammu and Kashmir, India

rdf:langString Ganderbal, Jammu and Kashmir, India

rdf:langString Activity years

rdf:langString In 1992, two terrorists arrived in the village, determined to burn out the temple. Hamid Bhat stole their rifles and handed them to a friend who passed them on to central reserve police force . The temple was saved but Hamid Bhat and his family had to pay a heavy price. He and his mother were kidnapped. The family had to sell its land to pay a ransom of Rs. 20,000. His mother was found naked, badly beaten and incoherent days later. She will not discuss just what happened. For reasons no one in the family quite understands, Hamid Bhat chose to stay on with his captors. He was, perhaps, unable to face humiliation of what had happened to his mother. Whatever the truth, the teenager who saved Tulamulla temple went on to become one of the most feared leaders of HM.

rdf:langString It is said that once to escape the security men, he jumped in the syendh river near the temple and stayed under water for hours, breathing though a hollow reed. Aaja Ai Bahaar Dil hai... much like Shammi Kapoor and Rajendra Nath in that old film song. From that day on wards, people started calling him 'Hameed Gada', Hamid The Fish.

rdf:langString Abdul Hamid Bhatt (also known as Hamid Gada, and Bomber Khan) was a commander in the Islamist militant organisation Hizbul Mujaheddin. He was killed in an encounter on 13 March 2000 by Indian security forces. Hamid Gada, at the time of his death, was the most wanted North Kashmiri militant. He had been called "Jammu and Kashmir's most important terrorist leader" by Indian journalist Praveen Swami, responsible for the massacres of numerous Kashmiri Hindus, including the 1998 Wandhama massacre. Press Trust of India said that in total, over a period of ten years of militancy, he was responsible for killing over a hundred civilians.