Nowgam residents recount horrific night

Srinagar, Nov 15: Panic gripped Nowgam on Friday night after a powerful accidental blast inside the police station in the locality shattered the calm of the entire neighbourhood.

Officials said the explosion occurred at around 11.20 p.m. while a team of police was handling explosives recovered in Faridabad, Haryana, last week at Nowgam Police Station.

Residents said the blast sound ripped through the vicinity with such a force that window panes and glass structures broke hundreds of meters away--plunging the area into fear.

They said as the deafening sound echoed across Nowgam, people were in shock, unaware of what had happened. Locals reported that electricity was cut in the locality immediately after the explosion, further deepening the panic. Many residents said they spent the entire night in their homes, unable to sleep, as aftershocks of fear lingered long after the blast.

“I woke up to a deafening sound and within seconds, glass from the building shattered around me,” said Bashir Ahmed, watchman at an office. Standing amid broken window panes on Saturday morning, he showed minor cuts on his face. “Some glass bits hit me. For a moment, I thought the whole building had collapsed. It was horrifying,” he added.

Not far from the trust office, Abdul Hamid, a resident of Sheikh-ul-Alam Colony, said his family was thrown into chaos the moment the blast occurred. “My elder brother is a heart patient. He became unstable after hearing the sound. The children screamed, people were running in the dark, and nobody knew what had happened,” he recalled. Hamid’s three-storey residential building suffered extensive damage to its windows. “The entire night we sat awake. Nobody could sleep,” he said.

For many, the impact of the blast extended far beyond physical damage. Junaid, another resident, said he initially thought it was an air explosion. “The whole sky turned red for a moment. My bedroom shook like an earthquake. The window panes burst instantly. When I called my friends who live closer to the police station, they told me the impact near them is far worse,” he said.

By early morning, Nowgam had transformed into a restricted zone. Locals said roads leading to the police station were sealed with barricades, and entry and exit points were blocked as a precautionary measure. Security agencies and senior police officials flooded the area as dozens of journalists gathered, trying to obtain details of the incident. In the aftermath, most shops remained shut and the usually busy market stretch wore a deserted look. Traffic flow had thinned drastically, with only a few vehicles seen on the roads.

Some residents said that they were desperately attempting to reach their relatives living closer to the blast site but were stopped at barricades. “I want to go to my cousin’s house near the police station, but the road is closed. We are just calling each other again and again to know if everyone is safe,” said Muhammad Shafi, waiting near the blast site.

Shopkeepers said they had no intention of opening their stores amid the uncertainty. Even auto rickshaw drivers, usually quick to pick up passengers, refused to enter the area.

“The situation in the area is tense, and there are barricades near the site. I cannot drop you there at the moment,” a rickshaw operator told this reporter.

With widespread damage to homes, offices, and commercial structures, and fear still visible on the faces of residents, Nowgam residents spent the day trying to comprehend the magnitude of the incident that shook the locality overnight.