Crackdown on religious parties

Specially constituted teams of police and the para-military Rangers cracked down on religious parties in Karachi yesterday, arresting their main leaders and some 400 others following the killings of two Tehrik-e-Jafria Pakistan workers in the city on Monday night. Officials confirmed the arrest of 25 people. They included Allama Hasan Turabi, the Sindh chief of the TJP, Mirza Yusuf and S M Haider, while Maulana Ghafoor Nadeem and Abu Bakr, son of Maulana Mahmood Ahmad Madni of Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan were also taken into custody.

But the two parties put the number of the detainees at 400. They said that security forces had carried out a massive operation spread over six hours, from past midnight to early morning, and had picked up anyone and everyone they could find in their houses. The idea was to prevent the workers of the two parties from taking out processions or disturbing peace.

The action did have a salutary effect as life went on normally, including on M A Jinnah and I I Chundrigar Roads which were the hub of commerce and business. A heavy police guard was posted outside the Mehfil-e-Shah-e-Khorasan from where the workers of the TJP had planned to take out a funeral procession of Muzaffar Kirmani and Nazir Abbas, the two activists who were gunned down in the crowded Soldier Bazar area on Monday night. The TJP activists died on the spot.

Local SSP leader Maulana Asadullah Wasaya escaped an attack on his life in the Korangi suburb. The incident in Soldier Bazar, a locality in the heart of the city, caused tension as a small crowd of angry protesters tried to set fire to a private car. About 100 TJP members took to the streets near the mosque after the murders, setting a car on fire, blocking the road and pelting stones at passing vehicles.

About 50 people who were trying to block the road were detained, local administration head Iqbal Hussain Durrani said. "It is an act of terrorism related to sectarian killings," Durrani said of the shootings. Police and paramilitary troops have been deployed at religious schools to stem the cycle of violence. The TJP has denied responsibility for the murders of five Islamic scholars here last week, which provoked violent riots throughout the city.