Operation in Karachi on the cards: Khursheed Shah

Shah says that all stakeholders including the ANP and the MQM support such an action.

ISLAMABAD: Syed Khursheed Shah, the central leader of Pakistan Peoples Party and the federal minister for religious affairs, on Monday said that an operation in Karachi is on card to bring normalcy to the violence plagued megalopolis.

Talking to the media after briefing a parliamentary committee, Shah claimed that all stakeholders have been taken on board in this regard, adding that all political parties including MQM and ANP support such an action in this city.

Government has to decide the method of action, so that collateral damage should be avoided in such operation. He opined that it is not enough to say that the killings in Karachi are only of a sectarian nature, adding that that the question is about saving the country, not the government.

ANP’s petition in Supreme Court on Karachi issue

Meanwhile, Awami National Party (ANP) leader Senator Haji Muhammad Adeel, on Monday also approached the Supreme Court on the worsening law and order situation in Karachi.

Adeel said that apex court’s orders given in suo motu case pertaining to worsening law and order situation in Karachi were violated by authorities concerned. He requested the court to initiate contempt of court proceedings against Chief Secretary, Home Secretary and Inspector General of Police Sindh for their defiance.

Haji Adeel is senior vice president of ANP. He field contempt of court petition through his counsel Abdul Latif Afridi. Raja Muhammad Abbas, Chief Secretary, Waseem Ahmed, Home Secretary and Faiz Laghari, Inspector General of Police, Sindh Karachi are made respondents in the petition, as responsible to implement, execute the orders, directions of the court but they have willfully neglected the same and thus they have willfully disobeyed the directions which warrants contempt proceedings against them.

He contended that the observations and declarations, made in the suo motu case regarding worst law and order situation in Karachi by the apex court on October 6, 2012 have been willfully ignored rather violated.

Haji Adeel recalled that the apex court had observed in the said order that in order to avoid political polarisation and to break up the cycle of ethnic strife and turf-war boundaries of administrative units like police stations, revenue estates etc ought to be altered so that members of different communities may live in peace and harmony and subsequent there to de-limitation of different constituencies has also be undertaken with the same object to make Karachi as peaceful city.

The petitioner however, contended that the respondents including Chief Secretary, Home Secretary and IGP, Sindh have done nothing in this regard and thus the observations and declarations of the court stand violated flagrantly ever after the passage of more than a year.

Similarly, he submitted that the court direction regarding formation of a commission by the provincial government to make inquiries and give findings with respect to compensations to those who lost their lives and properties was also not yet implemented, adding that at least he is not aware of any such step which by itself amounts to contempt of court.