NEW DELHI, Aug. 25 (Xinhua) -- The Indian government Thursday said that it is looking to soon introduce an alternative to pellet guns, which are used by security forces for security control in Indian-controlled Kashmir.
Indian Home Minister Rajnath Singh said in Kashmir's capital Srinagar Thursday that the report of an expert panel set-up by him to suggest alternatives to pellet guns was expected within a few days.
"The report of the (expert) committee will come within two to three days. Within a few days, we will have an alternative to pellet guns," Singh told the media in Srinagar in a joint media meet with the northern state's Chief Minister Mehbooba Mufti.
Sources said that PAVA shells, a chilli-based munition which temporarily incapacitates the target, could be an altervative being weighed by the expert committee, though there has been no official confirmation on this.
Hundreds of people in Kashmir have sustained pellet gun injuries after Indian security forces fired them to quell mob violence in the region that broke out since the killing of 22-year-old Burwan Wani, Hizbul Mujahiddin's poster boy for new militancy last month.
Pellet guns are a form of shotgun that were first used by the police as a non-lethal weapon to quell protests in Kashmir in 2010. Usually used for hunting animals, the gun fires a cluster of small, round-shaped pellets, which resemble iron balls, with high velocity.
