KARACHI, June 1: A meeting of Save Sindh Committee (SSC) has held President Gen Pervez Musharraf, the Sindh government and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM) responsible for the May 12 carnage.
Politicians, intellectuals, writers, lawyers, human rights activists, and others attended the meeting held at the PMA House, to discuss rights of the Sindhis particularly in the post May 12 situation.
Being in-charge of the home department, they held the MQM responsible for the mayhem.
They said that Karachi was the city of Sindh and Sindhis had the first claim over it. The said that Sindhis should be given complete control over their natural resources and demanded that sovereign and autonomous status of Sindh, as provided in the 1940 resolution, be recognised and given. They also took strong exception to the term ‘Mini Pakistan’ for Karachi which they considered as a deliberate and calculated move to get control of the port city from the Sindhis.
The speakers said that only those should be described as Sindhis who had their permanent abode in the province and they had all the political and citizenship rights here. They also expressed concern over the continuous and unhindered influx of people from other provinces as well as countries into Sindh.
They, however, said that those people who had come here from other provinces for employment be provided with basic human rights, but they should enjoy their political rights, including right to vote, in their ancestral areas only.
A six member committee was also formed to chalk out a line of action.
Abdul Khalique Junejo of Jeay Sindh Mahaz, Yusuf Mustikhan of National Workers Party, Umer Ather of Piler, Muqtida Mansoor, Bari Mangi of Sindhi Adabi Sangat, Dr Tipu Sultan of PMA, Jan-i-Alam and Salahuddin Gandapur of KBA, journalists MB Naqvi, Taj Baloch and others were among the participants.
