Burial rites: PPP activist laid to rest under a cloud of bullets

MNA Nabeel Gabol claims he was attacked, the police disagrees.

KARACHI: Gunshots were echoing in Lyari as Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) veteran activist and Lyari’s former naib nazim Malik Mohammad Khan was being laid to rest on Friday.

MNA Nabeel Gabol claimed that he was attacked while 35-year-old Malik Mushtaq, another PPP leader, was shot dead during a crossfire between the police and gangsters.

On Thursday, after the Supreme Court’s conviction of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani, Khan began gathering people for a protest in Lyari. He was gunned down minutes later by men who tried to disperse the protest at Aath Chowk. He was leading the crowd when four men on two motorcycles cornered him and opened fire. So far the authorities have registered a FIR against unidentified suspects but don’t know who killed him. Khan’s brother. Malik Mushtaq Awan, said “When my brother was killed there were a lot of people present, but now they say that they didn’t see the suspects. My brother did not have any personal enmity with the banned Peoples Amn Committee.” He added that PPP supporters were not safe in Lyari anymore.

The funeral was attended by Sindh Assembly Speaker Nisar Khuhro, MNA Nabeel Gabol, Sindh Finance Minister Murad Ali Shah, MPA Haji Muzaffar Shajra and Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz’s Saleem Zia. It was held at Bakra Piri after Zuhr  as police patrolled the area. Khan was buried in the Mewa Shah graveyard.

Khan’s cousin, Mushtaq, was shot dead on his way to the funeral near Miran Naka. The police claim that Mushtaq was Khan’s cousin.

According to MNA Gabol, a hand grenade was thrown at his convoy of 25 police personnel in four police mobiles and his black Prado in which he was escorted to Lyari. He said that gangsters opened fire at his convoy near Miran Naka. Gabol’s brother Sarfaraz who was also with him, told The Express Tribune that they knew something like this would happen.

However, a source in the police said that Gabol was not attacked as the MNA and his brother were escorted to Lyari in an Armoured Personnel Carrier.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 28^th, 2012.