From correspondents in Delhi, India, 08:01 PM IST

Bajrang Dal activists Saturday held demonstrations outside the Jammu and Kashmir house here protesting any move to cancel a controversial land allotment to the Amarnath shrine authorities.

'They were carrying swords and were throwing stones on the J and amp;K house. They also damaged a police bus and broke its window panes,' the police officer added.

The protestors shouted slogans against the Jammu and Kashmir government and also burned the effigies of leaders of the state government.

The police had use water cannons to disperse them.

'Six persons were arrested for rioting,' the police officer said.

Meanwhile, Roots in Kashmir, an organisation of Kashmiri Pandits, along with several other similar groups such as Panun Kashmir, Kashmiri Samiti Delhi, All India Kashmiri Samaj, Panun Kashmiri Movement and Jammu Kashmir Vichar Manch will stage a protest at Jantar Mantar Sunday morning against what they call an attempt to communalise the land transfer issue.

The Kashmir cabinet in March allotted 40 hectares of forest land in Baltal in north Kashmir to the Shri Amarnath Shrine Board (SASB) for providing facilities to pilgrims. SASB chief executive Arun Kumar, who was transferred Saturday, kicked a row by saying the board was going to make concrete structures on the allotted land which now had its proprietorship.

The state government rebutted him and said the land had not been allotted to the board but temporarily diverted to itt. Since then there has been an unrelnting public controversy that snowballed into major protests both in the Valley and the Jammu region.

(Staff Writer, © IANS)