police kill 2 in kashmir temple clash

SRINAGAR, Indian-controlled Kashmir (AP) -- Police in Indian Kashmir opened fire Monday at hundreds of stone-throwing Hindu protesters angry over a government decision to not transfer land to a Hindu shrine, killing two people, an official said.

Both protesters were shot to death in the clash in Jammu city, said Ramesh Kumar, a police officer. Sixteen others were wounded, he said.

In June, the government in Jammu-Kashmir, India's only Muslim-majority state, decided to award 99 acres of land to the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board, a trust that maintains the Amarnath shrine, a revered Hindu site.

The shrine contains a large icicle revered by Hindus as an incarnation of Lord Shiva, the Hindu god of destruction and regeneration. Hundreds of thousands of Hindus are currently visiting the shrine on an annual pilgrimage.

The state government was forced to revoke the land transfer last month after a week of often-violent protests by Muslims who called the move an attempt to build Hindu settlements in the area and alter the demographics in the state. Six people were killed and hundreds wounded in the protests.

But the cancellation set off protests by Hindus. On Monday, protesters defied a curfew order and poured into the streets of Jammu, the only Hindu-majority city in the state, and Samba, a town on its outskirts.