When the system withers away

The brutal killing of a local Sindhi nationalist leader in Karachi and the conduct of the police in handling the gruesome incident has left the civil society, political activists and the legal fraternity in a state of shock. What was more frightening was to hear the provincial chief executive revealing about the ‘existence of a police state’ threatening the ‘writ of the government’. But it is debatable as to what extent the political leadership or the ruling cliques have themselves been responsible for bringing about this collective deterioration in the conduct and functioning of the police force.

Irshad Ranijhani, the Karachi chief of the Jeay Sindh Tehreek, was shot dead on February 6 by the chairman of a union council, Abdul Rahim Shah, who belongs to the PML-N. Not only was Ranijhani killed in a cold-blooded manner, he was left writhing and bleeding on the road as Shah did not allow rescue services to move the wounded man to a hospital. And when Ranijhani was picked up from the site, the police took him to the police station instead of a hospital. As a video of the incident went viral on social media, civil society reacted strongly to the brutal killing and the callous role of the police.

What followed the brutal incident also left a question mark over the working of the government and its departments. Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah really sounded helpless when he briefed the provincial assembly how he asked the Sindh police chief for a proper investigation into the incident. But instead of obliging the CM, the police, terming the incident an act of robbery and mugging, came out with a list of criminal cases registered against Ranijhani at different police stations.

Monday’s protest over Ranijhani’s killing and the CM’s address in the assembly clearly expose the wrongs in the system of governance. The political leadership must itself take responsibility for this state of affairs. Not long ago, Naqeebullah Mehsood was eliminated in an equally-brutal manner by a police party and the Sindh government took some action only after the intervention of the Supreme Court.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 13^th, 2019.

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