In custody: Filmmaker insists he pulled the trigger by accident

Mansoor Mujahid is currently in jail for his alleged involvement in a banker’s killing.

KARACHI: The award-winning filmmaker, Mansoor Mujahid, who was recently arrested for killing a former banker, insists that it was an accident.

In an interview with The Express Tribune on Tuesday, Mujahid clarified that he never confessed to the murder of 33-year-old Faisal Nabi. Responding to the police’s claims that he had confessed, Mujahid said, “It is true that the gun was in my hands but I did not kill him intentionally. It was just an accident.”

The director of an independent film ‘Seedlings’, Mujahid and his female friend, A*, were arrested by Clifton police on June 22, after their acquaintance, M - who was accompanying Nabi the night of the murder - complained to the police that Mujahid shot Nabi on the night between June 19 and June 20 after consuming MDMA pills. After the shooting, Mujahid and A tried to burn the body to make it unidentifiable and later wrapped it in a white cloth and dumped it in Clifton, M told the police.

This led to the arrest of Mujahid and his female friend, who were later presented before a district and sessions court and remanded into Clifton police’s custody until June 28.

On Tuesday, Mujahid recalled that night to The Express Tribune from behind the bars. Wearing a red t-shirt and blue jeans, he admitted that Nabi’s death scared him. On that night, Mujahid, his friend A, Nabi and his friend M were present inside his flat on Zamzama. As he defended himself by claiming he was under the influence of drugs, he blamed M as well. “Faisal died by accident and I was unconscious because of the drugs,” he said. “Once Faisal breathed his last, M’s role began.”

The death scared all of us but it was M who advised Mujahid and A to burn the body and hide it, he claimed. “I had no idea what to do and this was not pre-planned,” he said, adding that M suggested they should dispose of the body. “If any of this was planned for, I would never have met the police at my flat when they raided it.”

Mujahid did accept that it was wrong to burn the body to remove any identification but he only did what M suggested. “It was my mistake that I followed what she said. The police should include her in the investigations as well.”

Investigations proceed

Meanwhile, the investigation officer of the case, Chaudhry Saleem told The Express Tribune that the case is very simple and the police are just waiting for some formalities, such as the forensic reports.

The police are, however, trying to figure out the actual motive behind the killing since Mujahid insists he accidently pulled the trigger during a fight.

“M* is the only eyewitness in the case,” he said, explaining why the police have not taken action against her. Saleem will now sit with both the accused and the lonely witness, M, at the same place and record their statements before submitting a charge sheet in the court.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 26^th, 2013.