Leh: A photograph of him in uniform, adorned with garlands, sat next to a fluttering tricolour front and centre, and the chanting of prayers rent the air. As a cavalry of cars that made up the funeral procession of ex-serviceman Tsewang Tharchin moved through the heavily guarded streets of Leh, the spectacle was starkly different from the muted funerals of the three other men killed in firing by security personnel when a pro-statehood protest turned violent on 24 September.

The sound of engines filled the cold mountain air as one vehicle after another whizzed through the heart of a city still under curfew. When 25-year-old Stanzin Namgail and 24-year-old Jigmet Dorjee’s last rites took place the previous day, things were quieter. Even when Rinchen Dorjay’s funeral was held on the same f

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