A First Information Report (FIR) was lodged against nine leaders of Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) on Friday for several violations of law during a protest rally held earlier in Numaish Chowrangi, Karachi. The FIRs were penned down against the MQM leaders for violating the loudspeaker act under section 144 of the Pakistan Penal Code, for setting up road blocks and for harassing citizens.
According to Superintendent Police (SP) Jamshed Town Dr. Fahd Ahmed, cases have been registered against Haider Abbass Rizvi, Dr. Farooq Sattar, Waseem Akhtar, Nasreen Jaleel, Mohammad Hussain, Kamaal Pasha, Kanwar Naveed Jameel and Faisal Sabzwari.
He said that Soldier Bazaar police nominated nine MQM leaders in the FIR for harassing the citizens, blocking the roads, violating the loudspeaker act and Section 144 of the Pakistan Penal Code late on Thursday.
In a message tweeted on social media website Twitter, MQM leader Wasay Jaleel stated that an FIR had also been registered against him even though he is in London.
He criticized the Sindh government and Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) calling the FIR as “cheap tactics” of the PPP government. The police closed all roads leading to the Rangers Headquarters by placing containers. The water cannons to disperse the crowd were also brought at the Chowrangi.
The cases were registered on the government’s complaint in Soldier Bazar police station.
MQM’s Rabita Committee had earlier called its workers to gather in front of the Rangers Headquarters to protest against Rangers’ raids in its offices in Korangi and Sultanabad and allegedly arresting over a 100 of its workers within a span of four days.
MQM protesters were however stopped from marching towards the Rangers Headquarters following which they staged a sit-in at the Numaish Chowrangi instead. The MQM leaders subsequently ended the rally.
The blockade of Numaish Chowrangi caused a severe traffic jam on adjacent roads.
The leaders including Haider Abbas Rizvi and Farooq Sattar while addressing the demonstrators said that it is not possible to defeat MQM in Karachi.
These suspected must face the charges and fight a legal battle against charges. Put your political views aside, Play transparent politics not upon ethnicity but national level to solve the problems of the people not of Mahajrizm. Karachi is mega city like all mega cities it has capacity to absorb Pakistanis from all corners. Leave past asid think about furure.
It is good for countries, and in fact it is the duty of the states to have laws, rules and regulations in order to ensure smooth functioning of the system. And on these grounds, filing of FIRs against MQM leaders for violating the loudspeaker ban would seem to be in order.
However, if the rules are formed in a spirit of revenge and to silence any genuine dissent, the strict application of rules would prove counter-productive because it is an even greater part of the duty of state officials not to create circumstances which force people to violate the rules. And it is this point which raises questions about the filing of FIRs in the present case. Normally, the city police, which has sufficient grounding in these matters, usually deals with such situations with reserve. However, there are times when police may be under pressure from certain quarters to act in any particular way, and probably that is the case here.
I think readers would remember the statement by Rangers that they would go after MQM’s sector and unit incharges, which was a clear indication that they intended to finish off MQM even politically, perhaps to create space in Karachi for their favourites Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf. And despite all odds, resounding success of MQM in NA-246 election has only increased their frustration. And joint stand by Peoples Party top leadership, and even its support from PML-N which feared that if continuation of action against higher-ups is allowed, they could next on the receiving end, had the desired effect and the anti-corruption part of the Karachi operation seems to have lost steam. And this has only added to frustration of the boys who consider MQM easy prey – since it does not offer active resistance to them like others do – and take out all their frustration against it.
Surely, it is time for General Raheel Sharif to restrain his boys from having fun and games with MQM, at least so near the local body elections. I have heard the saying ‘boys will be boys’ but surely at around age fifty, they are supposed to grow up to mature men, much like others do.
Karachi
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