Police high-handedness? Boy killed, five injured in police raid

Residents claim the police personnel were drunk when they came to the area

HYDERABAD: A 12-year-old boy was killed and five others, including two policemen, injured when a police team raided a residential block late on Thursday night in Hyderabad. The incident occurred in Gujrati Para, within the limits of Tando Yousuf police station.

The incident sparked a strong reaction from the residents who burnt a motorbike and blocked the railway track near Gujrati railway crossing. On Friday afternoon, hundreds of people laid siege to the SSP office along with the body of the 12-year-old, Zubair Ahmed, demanding the arrest of the policemen and registration of an FIR against them.

Large contingents of police, many in riot gear, were called in as the protesters threatened to break open the office's main gate. They dispersed after assurances that the accused policemen would be booked.

The residents allege that a few 'drunk' police officers opened indiscriminate fire at which they reacted with pelting their vehicle with stones. The police, however, say they had gone to arrest a suspect, Abbass alias Muni, but the residents resisted violently. "Tando Yousuf police patronises gambling and alcohol dens. They often come to our area to harass the people," alleged Arsalan, an elder brother of the deceased.

He claimed that what happened on Thursday night was a violent eruption of the said harassment. He also alleged that his deceased brother and the three injured persons, Ali Raza, Ishtiaq and Yameen, were all shot by the police.

In contrast, the SHO Ghulam Mustafa Laghari maintained that all the gunshot victims sustained wounds from bullets fired from one or more pistols. The raiding policemen were only carrying guns, he reasoned. The two policemen, Liaquat Ali and Mehmood Hussain, sustained injuries from stones and broken glass shreds.

Laghari, Ali and Hussain were subsequently nominated in an FIR registered under sections 302 and 324 of the CrPC and 34 of the PPC at the Tando Yousuf police station by Shakeel Qazi, the father of the deceased boy. But the SSP told The Express Tribune that the nominated officers would be arrested if they are found guilty in the police inquiry.

Separately, the SHO registered another FIR against the arrested accused, Abbass alias Mooni and his injured brother, Ishtiaq, Saleem, Aijaz and other unknown persons. Pakistan Sunni Tehreek's Hyderabad president Imran Suharwardi claimed his party's supporters have been victimised in the police assault.

The deceased boy was a Quran Hafiz. He sustained a gunshot in the chest. Initially shifted to the Civil Hospital, he was later referred to Jinnah hospital in Karachi where he succumbed to the injuries on Friday morning.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 29^th, 2015.