Civil society activists want heads rolled after Rawadari March crackdown

HYDERABAD: A conference was organised by an action committee at the Hyderabad Press Club on the issueof rising extremism in Sindh and public resistance against it.

In its resolutions that were passed at the end of the conference, the Joint Action Committee (JAC) Hyderabad asked the Sindh government to remove Sindh Home Minister Ziaul Hassan Lanjar, inspector general of police, and other police officers and officials responsible for violent crackdown on the participants of the Rawadari March in Karachi on Sunday.

Presenting the resolutions, Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) representative Imdad Chandio said a judicial commission comprising serving judges should be formed to investigate the extrajudicial killing of Dr Shahnawaz Kunbhar. He also demanded that police officials, including the suspended DIG and Umerkot and Mirpurkhas SSPs, be arrested along with religious leaders who called for killing Dr Kunbhar.

He said in the resolution that despite the condemnation statements and apology of Bakhtawar Bhutto Zardari and Sherry Rehman, the registration of an FIR against the organiser of the Sindh Rawadari March in Karachi showed double standards of the Pakistan Peoples Party. He demanded that the FIR be terminated.

The JAC also demanded that the PPP seek resignation of MNA Ameer Ali Shah who had presented flowers to police officers who killed Dr Kunbhar. Imdad said that as the slain doctor was an officer of the provincial health department, his family should be provided pension and other privileges.

Another resolution stated that the Sindh chief minister would be responsible for any threat to the family of Dr Kunbhar. It was also said that a special force and committees should be formed in every district to prevent false blasphemy accusations.

Those who participated in the conference included Taj Joyo, lawyer Yusuf Laghari, Amar Sindhu, Convener of Youth Action Committee Sindhu Nawaz Ghanghru, Arfana Mallah, Khalid Khokar, Bakhshal Thalho, Alia Bakhshal, HRCP Coordinator Ghufrana Arain, Samar Haider Jatoi, Dr Badr Chana, Saadia Baloch, Taj Marri, Prof Dr Rafiq Chandio, Dr Hameed Soomro, Wajid Leghari, Shahnaz Sheedi, Arshad Talpur, Marvi Awan, Ramesh Gupta and Zahida Dethu.

Meanwhile, writer Jami Chandio whose daughter was manhandled by the police in the Rawadari March posted on his social media account that Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah had called him and said he wanted to meet the friends of the Rawadari March, including him. According to Jami, he replied to the CM that what the Sindh government had done was now a history and the stain could not be washed away without seeking forgiveness.