He was buried quietly soon after, close to the cell he had spent so many years in solitary confinement. The Supreme Court had sentenced him to death in 2004.
As news spread of the execution - the second in India in just three months after the hanging of Pakistani Ajmal Amir Kasab for the Mumbai terror attack - scattered protests broke out in the Kashmir valley.
Curfew was clamped in major towns as police and paramilitary Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in full battle gear fanned out. Several people were injured, two of them critically, in clashes with forces.
The moderate faction of the separatist group Hurriyat Conference called for four days of mourning. The hanging, it said, was "political killing which has nothing to do with the legal system of India".
The government explained that legal process was followed.
