Veteran PPP MNA Nawab Yousuf Talpur laid to rest

Had served prison time during Zia's martial law; won every election since 1993 on PPP ticket

HYDERABAD:

A veteran politician who earned fame due to his political activism and incarceration for the Movement for the Restoration of Democracy (MRD), Pakistan Peoples Party's MNA Nawab Yousuf Talpur, breathed his last on Tuesday. He was 82.

Talpur was laid to rest in his ancestral village, Manjhakar, near Kunri after Namaz-e-Janaza. Sindh Chief Minister Syed Ali Shah, Senior Sindh Minister Sharjeel Inam Memon, PPP's senior leader Syed Khursheed Ahmed Shah, and many other leaders of the party besides thousands of local people, family and friends, attended the funeral.

Talpur stepped in the realm of ideologically motivated politics in the 1970s as a student leader. He was first elected to the provincial assembly on the PPP's ticket in 1977. Sometime later he parted ways with his party and joined Sindh National Front of Mumtaz Ali Bhutto. He contested the elections on SNF's tickets in 1988 and 1990 but faced defeat.

However, former Prime Minister and PPP's chairperson Benazir Bhutto brought him back in the party's fold in 1993 and since then he has been elected MNA from Mirpurkhas and Umerkot for six terms. He was elected as MNA in 1993, 2002, 2008, 2013, 2018 and 2024. Talpur kept fighting the case of water for Sindh province during all his stints in the National Assembly.

Talpur was under medical treatment for some months. He died at a hospital in Karachi. He has been survived by his wife, two sons and four daughters. One of his sons, Nawab Taimur Talpur, is an MPA of the PPP.

President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, Speaker of the National Assembly, Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, Deputy Speaker of the National Assembly Syed Ghulam Mustafa Shah, and Senate Chairman Syed Yousuf Raza Gilani, in their separate messages expressed condolences over the demise of Nawab Yousuf Talpur.

Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah, Senior Minister Sharjeel Memon, cabinet members and a wide section of political and social activists expressed grief on the passing away of the stalwart politician.