Visually-impaired muezzin deprived of smartphone by crook in Karachi

A visually-impaired muezzin (prayer caller) of a mosque has been deprived of his smartphone in Gulistan-e-Jauhar. The suspected robber also changed the password of an online application in the phone and withdrew Rs35,000 from his account.

“I was coming out of the mosque between Asr and Maghrib prayers two days ago when a man exiting the mosque after Asr prayer approached me and introduced himself before adding that your voice is very good,” the muezzin, Muhammad Amjad, told The Express Tribune.

“If you recite a na’at for me, I shall film it on your smartphone and upload it to social media which would go viral,” Amjad recalled the suspected robber as telling him.

Amjad said that they went back into the mosque and as soon as he started reciting a na’at, the suspect fled with the smartphone. “There were no worshippers inside the mosque when I and the suspect entered,” he said.

“There was a scanned copy of my national identity card in my phone. The suspect changed the password of an online app on my phone and transferred Rs35,000 to other mobile numbers,” he added.

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Amjad said that he was saving money to perform Umrah, but the suspect took away his savings.

The mosque administrator, Muhammad Osama, said that they have obtained video footage from the CCTV cameras of the mosque and handed it over to police and Rangers to identify the suspect.

The CCTV footage shows the suspect parking his motorcycle outside the mosque before sitting down with the muezzin who starts reciting na’at, while the suspect film him for a while before running off with the mobile phone.

Local police have started a search for the suspect on the complaint of the muezzin.