November 17, 2007	Saturday	Ziqa’ad 06, 1428

FAISALABAD, Nov 16: Unavailability of police to protect the life and property of a man on the street appears to be the fresh casualty of the emergency rule as a cleric lost his son to criminals who targeted the family to settle score.

The armed intruders also left six other members of the family injured.

Information gleaned by Dawn revealed that some men, armed with guns, daggers and clubs, barged into Maulvi Muhammad Ismail’s house at Awami Colony in Gulberg police precinct.

They opened indiscriminate fire as a result of which six people, including Ismail’s father and two sons, Mukhtar and Gulzar, a woman and a girl, suffered injuries. The intruders also clubbed the women and rifled the house before escaping.

The injured were shifted to the Allied Hospital where Mukhtar breathed his last and the condition of two was reported critical.

Area people said the firing continued for nearly half an hour, but the police reached 40 minutes after the incident despite repeated calls.

One of the constables, when quizzed, said the police could not attend to such cases promptly these days because they were engaged in a ‘secret operation’ — an operation against the political activists.

A policeman told Dawn on the request of anonymity that it was very difficult for the officials to give prompt response to any emergency call these days as “they are not even able to have proper sleep because of emergency rule”.

The main focus of the police department, he said, was detention of political activists and lawyers in the post-emergency scenario.

Saying that most of the employees nowadays remained on duty till 4am daily, he defended the colleagues by asking: “How can you expect them to move energetically”.

All employees had been directed to be alert for midnight clampdown to catch the activists of the opposition parties and lawyers, he said.

A constable of the Gulberg police said when officers got information about the incident, they went to hospital instead of crime scene to bring the situation under control and preserve the evidence.

People said a few days ago, Gulzar was physically tortured by Sajid Ali, a nephew of the main accused, and some people informed the police about the situation keeping in view the threats the criminals had hurled at Gulzar’s family.

They said the police did not turn up after the first clash and had they reached there, they could have easily saved the poor family.

Many people of the area have moved to their relatives for fear of any further attack by the criminals who had cases in different police stations.

Police said two boys from the accused party — Kashif and Atif—- also suffered injuries in the clash, but made good their escape from the hospital on hearing about the death of Mukhtar.

Gulberg police station SHO Jamshed Chishti denied the allegation that the police delayed action. “I and investigation in-charge Usman immediately rushed to the hospital for the statement of the injured.” The police had registered a case and launched the manhunt, he claimed.