Motive unclear: Roadside bomb kills maid, injures another

KARACHI:

A housemaid was killed and her daughter-in-law suffered injuries in Ferozabad after a hand grenade wrapped in a plastic bag exploded on Wednesday. The women had picked up the bag from the road, thinking it was a toy.

Around 11am an explosion was heard on Khalid Bin Waleed Road and its surrounding areas. Initially, the media was under the impression that the victims were suicide bombers who wanted to target an imambargah.

Following the explosion, a large number of law enforcers, including Rangers and police, reached the site and cordoned off the locality.

“We found a severely injured body of one woman, who was already dead, while the other woman was critically injured,” said Ferozabad’s Liberty Chowk police post in-charge Saadat Butt, while talking to The Express Tribune. The body and the woman were shifted to Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC). The injured woman is under treatment at the hospital under police custody.

“One woman was brought dead and the other one was critically injured,” said Dr Seemin Jamali of the JPMC, while talking to The Express Tribune. “They had suffered multiple pellet injuries. Now, the injured woman is stable.”

On receiving information, the victims’ family members and relatives reached the hospital. The deceased was identified as 45-year-old Nasreen, wife of Rab Nawaz, and her daughter-in-law, Azra, wife of Amir. The police have also recorded Azra’s statements. “We found a shopping bag on the roadside. We thought it was a toy, so we picked it up. As we were walking towards our workplace, the bag suddenly exploded,” the injured woman told the police.

Soon after the blast, there were rumours that the women intended to target an imambargah. Police investigators, however, ruled out the possibility of terrorism by claiming that it was an accident. Imambargah Mehfil-e-Murtaza is situated at a distance of 1.5 kilometres from the blast site.

“We are not terrorists,” said Azra’s husband, Amir, a scrap cart-vendor. “We belong to a poor family. But, in the news channels, my mother and my wife are being labelled as suicide bombers - which is not fair.”

They hail from Multan and belong to a Saraiki family. In Karachi, they live in Lines Area. The women used to work as housemaids in PECHS.

According to a spokesperson for Sindh police, the incident was not an attack or an attempt to sabotage. They worked in different houses to earn a living. “They were going to work when they found a bag on the roadside and picked it up,” the spokesperson clarified. “It exploded in their hands, killing Nasreen and injuring Azra.”

Police officials believe that it might have been an extortion threat for a car showroom close by. “We have not found any clue that would suggest it was a terror activity. For now, we can say that it was just an accident,” said district East SSP Pir Mohammad Shah.

“We have questioned all of their family members and the family has no links with any terrorist outfits.” SSP Shah said the investigators believed Azra was speaking the truth, adding that the police did not arrest anyone from their family. Talking about the explosives, he said that it was a hand grenade explosion. A case has yet to be registered.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 19^th, 2013.