Karachi Thousands of security personnel along with hundreds of police and paramilitary commandos will be deployed around Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) chairman Bilawal Bhutto for his October 18 rally.

Residential areas surrounding the venue has been almost sealed and schools have been shut as stringent measures are being put in place ahead of the weekend rally of Bilawal, who was prompted to launch himself after cricketer-turned politician Imran Khan held a series of mammoth rallies all over the country including Karachi.

Imran’s rallies, analysts say, have helped his party overshadow the PPP and other parties’ popularity and the Bilawal’s Saturday rally is seen as a bid to revive the party which was losing its foothold and is now confined only to the southern province.

The young Bhutto in a twitter message discouraged media against broadcasting reports of security threats against him, saying he was not afraid of terrorists and that on the contrary terrorists were threatened by him.

Sources at Bilawal House, which is named after the young PPP leader, said that some 300 commandos from the special services unit (SSU) of police in addition to 100 commandos of paramilitary rangers would cordon off the stage from where Bilawal would address the rally.

In all, 10,000 policemen will be deployed to provide security for the rally, whereas 6,000 paramilitary rangers would help reinforce security measures.

The PPP leadership was expecting that some 30,000 vehicles from all across the country would flood into the city to transport the participants to the rally. Around 1,000 traffic police would also be deployed to regulate the huge influx of vehicles.

Police and intelligence agencies have been gathering personal data of residents of the Lines Area adjoining the vast open ground across the mausoleum of Mohammad Ali Jinnah, the founding father of the nation.

The large ground was fortified by placing hundreds of shipping containers on three sides of the venue to create a temporary boundary wall and similar containers were used for a 160ft stage from where Bilawal would address the rally.

The growing popularity of Imran’s party poses threats to several political entities which are losing their footholds.

PPP, which was in power in Islamabad and in coalition in three out of four provinces in the country in 2008 elections, was reduced to holding power only in rural Sindh province in the last national elections held in 2013.