‘They stole our father from us’

Funeral prayers for four policemen martyred in SITE on Friday offered in Karachi

KARACHI: The terrorists did not take our brother from us, they stole our father, said Sajid, the younger brother of Muhammad Khalid, a police officer who lost his life in the line of duty during a recent armed attack.

Khalid and three of his fellow policemen lost their lives on Friday night when four armed gunmen, riding on motorcycles, opened fire on them while they were having iftar at a roadside hotel near Habib Bank Chowrangi in SITE.

The four policemen were all shot multiple times – the terrorists first shot them in their heads, killing them on the spot.

Constable Khalid was the eldest of 11 siblings. "After the death of our father, bhai [Khalid] took care of us like a father," said Sajid.



A policeman’s life is always at risk and his family was worried about Khalid. "We always worried about bhai and now all of our worries have come to fruition as he is no more but we are the family of a 'shaheed'," said another of Khalid’s brothers, Asif.

Belonging to a middle-class family, Khalid lived in Orangi Town. He was married but childless. Keeping the threats in view, Khalid always told his brothers to take care of the family as he could be killed at any time. "That afternoon he called and asked me to take care of the family if he lost his life," Asif recalled.

Khalid was a senior cop and was to retire soon. "Four months were left for his retirement and he was worried that he would be retired instead of embracing martyrdom but finally he embraced martyrdom," the cop’s brother explained.

Funeral prayers

The policemen’s funeral prayers were offered at Police Headquarters in Garden. Apart from relatives, provincial minister Manzur Wasan, Rangers Director-General Major-General Muhammad Saeed, Sindh IG Allah Dino Khawaja, Karachi Additional IG Mushtaq Maher and various other officials, including zonal DIGs and district SSPs attended the funeral prayers.



Of the four, Khalid was the policeman who was a native of Karachi, the others were from other parts of the country and their bodies were taken to their hometowns for the burial process. The body of ASI Yousuf was shifted to Mansehra, Constable Israr's body taken to Haripur while Constable Shabbir's body was taken to Rawalpindi.

However, after the department handed Khalid's body over to the family, the family again offered his funeral prayers near his home in Orangi Town and later buried him at the alFateh graveyard in Orangi Town amid tears and wails.

Case registered

The police have registered a case at the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) on behalf of the state. Sections from the Anti-Terrorism Act and the Pakistan Penal Code have been added in the FIR registered against unidentified persons.



Investigations

A pamphlet bearing a message from militant group Ansar alSharia, Pakistan was found at the crime scene. In it, the group has claimed responsibility for the attack on the policemen. Police investigators suspect that the group may have also been involved in at least two other terror activities in Karachi in the last few months but the investigators have yet to trace the suspects behind these unsolved incidents and arrest them.

In the closed-circuit television footage obtained from the crime scene, armed motorcyclists can be seen firing at the policemen and fleeing the scene. They returned seconds later and tossed the pamphlets on the ground.

Lashkar-e-Jhangvi alAlmi has also claimed responsibility for the attack, terming it ‘revenge’ on law enforcers for their behaviour with imprisoned militants after the recent jailbreak at Central Jail, Karachi.



"These are their [militants groups] old tactics to confuse investigators by claiming responsibility for such attacks by different groups," said a senior anti-terror officer. "No doubt a militant outfit is behind this incident but which one has yet to be ascertained.”

The investigators suspect that this group might also have been involved in two recent terrorist activities in the city - the targeted killing of a former military officer near the Baloch Colony flyover in March and an attack on a police mobile van in Dhoraji neighbourhood in May in which two policemen were killed and another was critically wounded. In fact, ballistic reports confirm that the same weapon was used in the SITE and Dhoraji attacks.

Throwing pamphlets is not uncommon in Karachi’s terrorist attacks, as during several earlier attacks militants have thrown pamphlets at crime scenes. An example of this is the Safoora Goth tragedy, where the culprits tossed Da’ish pamphlets on the ground after the incident.

CTD SSP Omar Shahid Hamid said that no breakthrough has been made in the case as yet, as the investigations are still at a preliminary level.