The parents were seen in handcuffs when they were being brought at the burial site.
Srinagar: A Rohingya couple was brought in handcuffs for the last rites of their child who died in a refugee detention centre near Jammu. A video of the handcuffed parents at the burial site has been widely shared on social media.
The 43-day-old baby died at a refugee "holding centre" where clashes broke out between inmates and police earlier this week. Several people, including three policemen and Rohingyas, were reportedly injured during clashes.
On Thursday, the baby's body was handed over to relatives at a Rohingya settlement in Jammu.
The parents were seen in handcuffs when they were being brought at the burial site and also when the body was handed over to relatives in Narwal in Jammu for last rites, showed two videos.
Jail authorities have denied that the baby died in clashes. According to Koushal Kumar, superintendent of Kathua district jail, who is also in-charge of the holding centre, the baby was suffering from some ailment and died two days after the incident at the detention centre.
Police have filed an FIR against Rohingyas allegedly involved in stone pelting at Hiranagar sub-jail - designated as the holding centre for Rohingyas.
271 Rohingyas, among them 144 women and children are detained at the holding centre.
Clashes broke out after Rohingyas, who held multiple hunger strike protests in the holding centre, demanded their release and deportation to their native country Myanmar.
The police resorted to lathicharge and resorted tear-gas shelling as a control measure.
Mr Kumar said the police were compelled to take action after inmates took three officials of jail staff, including a special police official, hostage and tried to break open the gate of the sub-jail at Hiranagar.
"Rohingyas have been demanding their release and deportation to their native country," the official said.
Mr Kumar said they have already forwarded the case to the home department for the deportation of Rohingyas.
Salim Mohammad and his wife had come to Jammu in 2012. The couple, along with their eldest son, were arrested by police during the checking of refugee cards issued by the UN. Even as Salim also had a UNHCR card that allows Rohingyas to stay as refugees, the family was lodged at the Jammu district jail at Ambphalla before they were shifted to the holding centre in Hiranagar in 2021. The couple then went on to have two more children at the centre.
Over the last several years, political parties and right-wing groups have been demanding the deportation of Rohingya refugee from Jammu. These groups allege that Rohingyas have been settled in Jammu as a part of a conspiracy to engineer a demographic change in the region.
During these years, hundreds of shanties and hutments of the Rohingyas were burnt in the area.