Tributes paid to freedom fighter Sooriah Badshah

Paying rich tributes to freedom fighter Pir Pagara Sibghatullah Shah Rashdi II, also known as Sooriah Badshah, leaders of the Pakistan Muslim League-Functional and the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf on Friday praised him for choosing a life of trouble and miseries and sacrificing luxuries as he spearheaded the movement for freedom.

In view of the coronavirus spread, the PML-F has cancelled activities to mark the death anniversary of Badshah in Sindh’s various parts, including Karachi.

Badshah was sent to gallows on March 20, 1943, in the aftermath of a military court verdict for a guerrilla war against the British Raj. His body was not handed over to his heirs or to his followers, and his burial place is still not known.

Several leaders in their statement on Badshah’s anniversary said that the Hur uprising was a genuine freedom movement against the foreign occupation, which turned into a guerrilla war after the arrest of Sooriah Badshah.

PML-F Sindh president Pir Syed Sadarudin Rashidi, in a statement issued on Friday, the said that in 1922, when Sibghatullah Shah became Pir Pagara, he raised his voice against the humiliating attitude of British officers towards the Hur Jamaat and Sindhis in general.

Following the resistance of Sooriah Badshah and his followers, the British Empire initiated a harsh action against them, he said.

Rashidi demanded that the Hurr movement should be taught to students at schools and that a public holiday should be declared on March 20.

Huanaid Lakhani, a PTI Karachi leader and head of the Sindh Baitul Maal, also paid tributes to Badsahh sand said that the government should commemorate the struggle of the Hur leader at government level because he fought against the foreign rulers of the land.

He said the Hur leader sacrificed his life for the country and his body was also not handed over to the people of Sindh by the British.