In yet another incident of vigilante justice in the city, residents of Ancholi, Federal B Area, apprehended and beat up two suspects on Thursday. The residents accused the suspects of being target killers who had come to the area to attack a shopkeeper.
According to witnesses and police, at around 3:10pm, three alleged criminals arrived at Block 17 of Ancholi on two motorcycles. They opened fire on Shakeel Haider, a resident of the area, who also runs his catering business, Haider Pakwan, in the same vicinity.
Haider’s elder brother, Shahab Haider, who owned a pan shop in the area was targeted and killed by six attackers around eight months ago. On hearing Shakeel’s cries for help, residents and shopkeepers rushed to his rescue and apprehended two of the suspects. They later locked them up in Shakeel’s shop.
“Everyone present in the area at the time vented out their anger by beating up the two suspects,” said Hassan Abbas, one of Haider’s nephews. “They kept the police and Rangers at bay, not allowing them to take the suspects into custody.”
By this time, the frenzied mob had beaten the two suspects to near unconsciousness. One of the attackers had also allegedly sustained a bullet wound during the scuffle between the suspects and Shakeel, said Abbas. The police, however, refuted the claims of a gunshot wound.
“We locked them up inside the shop to save them from the mob but when the police and Rangers came to take them into custody, the enraged people started beating the suspects all over again,” said Abbas. “In the ensuing scuffle, the police were also pushed around.” The law enforcers subsequently had to fire into the air to disperse the crowd.
“My uncle had just returned from Liaquatabad, and was parking his car in the street, where his shop and house are located, when the attackers shouted at him to recite the Kalma,” narrated Abbas.
During the scuffle between the attackers and Haider, he got hold of a pistol from one of the suspects and fired at them. The bullet hit one of the attackers in the leg. In the meantime, the residents and shopkeepers reached to his rescue and captured two of the attackers. One of the suspects was from New Karachi and the other from Liaquatabad, he said. According to shopkeepers, the area has witnessed a steep rise in incidents of target killings over the last two to three years.
The police shifted the suspects to Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for treatment as they had been seriously injured by the mob. SHO Smanabad Nadir Khan said that the suspects have been identified as Bilal and Imran, who claim they are residents of Hub Chowki and Hyderabad, respectively. “We have not interrogated them yet as the doctors are not allowing us to do so,” he claimed. “We cannot say anything about what they were doing in the area until we have properly investigated the matter.”
Published in The Express Tribune, October 24th, 2014.
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Nice job!