Maulana Showkat Ahmad Shah, president of the Kashmir chapter of Jamiat Ahl-e-Hadith, an organization that has tens of thousands of followers in the Muslim majority Kashmir Valley, was entering a local mosque in the Maisuma locality in uptown Srinagar when the bomb went off.

“The maulana was critically wounded in the blast and shifted to hospital. He, however, died as doctors tried to revive him,” said a senior police officer.

He said the bomb had been tied to a bicycle parked just near the entrance to the mosque, where Shah would deliver Friday sermon.

A bystander was also critically wounded in the blast and is being treated, police said.

The killing triggered panic in the area and provoked a strong reaction as shopkeepers pulled down their shutters and traffic deserted the streets in the city center and adjoining areas.

Authorities deployed heavy security to deal with the situation that is now under control mainly because of the appeals for calm by Shah’s supporters.

Shah’s body was brought to the mosque for funeral prayers. Thousands of people joined the prayers in Lal Chowk.

Shouting pro-freedom and religious slogans, the supporters of Shah carried the body to a martyrs' graveyard at Eidgah for burial.

The assassination has evoked strong condemnation from various separatist groups and the pro-India Peoples Democratic Party.

Shah, who was closely associated with the pro-independence Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front chairman Yasin Malik, was seen as a moderate voice who had openly condemned the stone pelting in Kashmir. Chairman of the moderate All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC) Mirwaiz Moulvi Umar Farooq, while condemning the assassination, called for a shutdown in the valley on Saturday.