While some sit ins saw large crowds, at others people had enough space to lie down and relax. PHOTO: MUHAMMAD JAVAID/EXPRESS
RAWALPINDI:
Hundreds of activists of Ahle Sunnat Wal Jammat (ASWJ) staged a sit-in at the Faizabad Interchange on Saturday to protest the killing of their provincial leader Maulana Shamsur Rehman.
Protesters blocked the main roads linking Rawalpindi and Islamabad causing tremendous difficulties for residents, motorists and commuters alike.
Access to Islamabad through the Murree Road and Islamabad Highway was cut-off on Saturday, with ASWJ members aggressively blocked Faizabad using stones, bricks and sticks. They also forced cars and trucks moving through the Faizabad area to turn around.
People remained stuck in the traffic jams for hours as police diverted vehicles entering and exiting the capital on to the Double Road from Murree Road, and towards Park Road from the Islamabad Highway.
Commuters faced additional problems because the blockage of Faizabad Interchange by the ASWJ demonstrators also affected public transport routes.
“Staging protests, damaging properties and killing of innocent people have become a routine matter in the country,” said Muhammad Abbas, an employee of the Islamic International University Islamabad, who crossed the Faizabad Bridge on foot after being stuck in traffic for an hour.
Contingents of Rawalpindi and Islamabad police forces were deployed at the scene to oversee the security situation, but they mostly chose to remain on the sidelines during the protest, which continued throughout the day.
Activists, some of whom had their faces covered with handkerchiefs and keffiyehs, burnt tyres to express their anger and demanded the arrest of the killers of ASWJ’s Punjab President Shamsur Rehman Mauvia, who was killed in Lahore on Friday.
Meanwhile, ASWJ leaders urged the protesters to remain calm and peaceful when some demonstrators tried to damage public property.
Around 200 members of the ASWJ had also staged a protest gathering at the Aabpara Chowk on Friday evening to condemn Mauvia’s murder.
During the gathering, ASWJ leaders undertook long discussions with senior Islamabad administration and police officials which were believed to be about peaceful dispersal of the demonstrators from Aabpara chowk as well as Saturday’s sit-in. The protests ended around 8pm.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 8th, 2013.
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