KARACHI, Dec 2: A religious scholar and a homeopathic doctor were gunned down in an armed attack in Federal B Area on Monday evening, police said.

The Joharabad police said that Mufti Ahmed Shah Zaman, 36, along with his wife visited the clinic of a homeopathic doctor, Mohammed Tahir Usman, 50, in Federal B Area’s Block-14.

They were inside the clinic when a lone gunman, wearing shalwar-kameez, entered there, opened fire on the doctor and Mufti Zaman and fled, SSP-Central Amir Farooqi said, adding that both men sustained bullet wounds and were taken to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital where doctors declared them dead.

Mufti Zaman’s wife remained unhurt in the attack.

A hospital official said that the victim’s relatives and certain activists took away the body without allowing doctors to conduct a post-mortem examination.

“The double murder appears to be an act of targeted killing,” said the area SSP, as he believed that Mufti Zaman was the real target. He said Mufti Zaman was a Deobandi scholar and his father was also a mufti and the prayer leader of Masjid Quba in Bandhani Colony, Liaquatabad.

ANP man gunned down

A senior worker of the Awami National Party (ANP) was shot dead in a suspected targeted attack and his two friends were wounded in Sohrab Goth on Monday, police and party officials said.

They said Din Mohammed Wazir-Mehsud, in his late 30s, was returning home from Jinjal Goth in a car with his four friends when gunmen riding a motorcycle opened fire on them and fled. Mr Wazir-Mehsud died while his two friends, Ismail Mehsud and Tariq Mehsud, were injured, said Gulshan-i-Maymar SHO Bashir Ahmed. He added that the wounded men were out of danger.

“The killing appears to be an act of targeted killing,” said SSP-West Irfan Baloch.

Mr Wazir-Mehsud was a former office-bearer of the ANP in Malir district, said the ANP Sindh general secretary, Bashir Jan. He said his party’s senior worker was targeted in Sohrab Goth.

A source said that suspected militants had invited him to Jinjal Goth and he was killed while returning home in Gulshan View, Sohrab Goth.

The Gulshan-i-Maymar SHO confirmed that the victim had gone to the locality to attend a ‘Jirga’, but added that he did not know the purpose of the gathering there.

Meanwhile, the Rangers on Monday said that ‘vested interest groups’ were involved in the recent spate of targeted killings in the city to fuel tensions.

A meeting of the operational committee, headed by Rangers director general Maj-Gen Rizwan Akhtar, was held at the Bhittai Rangers headquarters to devise a strategy to deal with the ‘rising trend of killing’ in the city, according to a Rangers statement.

“Some of the militant wings are involved in the current killings,” said the statement.

It added that the law enforcement agencies got ‘some leads’ and would launch ‘fresh operations’ soon.

The Karachi police chief, senior Rangers and police officials attended the meeting.