‘Firing on unarmed protestors has shaken public trust and could have been managed with more patience’: Senior BJP leader and former Ladakh MP speaks out

Jamyang Tsering Namgyal, a senior BJP leader and former MP of Ladakh, stated that the police's actions on September 24 in Leh—specifically, firing on unarmed demonstrators—had “shaken the public trust.” He added that the crisis in the Union Territory could have been managed with more patience.The former MP, in correspondence dated September 25 with Lieutenant Governor Kavinder Gupta, requested an unbiased and transparent judicial investigation into the deaths of four protesters in Leh and called for the establishment of a “credible dialogue process.”Ladakh protest highlights: Following a violent escalation of a massive agitation over statehood and other demands in Leh, resulting in at least four fatalities and over 50 injuries, the home ministry reported that the situation in Ladakh has been under control since Wednesday at 4 PM.Live updates from the Ladakh protest: After the health of two individuals on a 35-day hunger strike since September 10 worsened, requiring their transfer to a medical facility on Tuesday evening, the youth wing of the Ladakh Apex Body (LAB) issued a protest call.

The hunger strike sought to compel the Centre to reopen discussions on their four-point charter of demands: statehood, an extension of the Sixth Schedule, separate Lok Sabha seats for Leh and Kargil, and employment reservations.According to officials cited by the PTI news agency, Leh town experienced a total shutdown on Wednesday in response to the protest call, as large crowds assembled at the NDS Memorial Ground and marched through the streets chanting slogans in favor of statehood and the Sixth Schedule. When some young people began hurling stones at the offices of the Hill Council and the BJP, the situation intensified. The report added that police and paramilitary forces, who had been deployed in large numbers throughout the town, fired teargas shells to restore control of the situation.