HYDERABAD: The Majlis-i-Wahdat-i-Muslimeen (MWM) and the banned Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamat (ASWJ) staged protests at different places in the city on Friday against an alleged crackdown on their workers.

MWM activists took out a rally from outside Qadamgah Maula Ali to denounce the Punjab police for arresting what it claimed scores of their party colleagues in that province during the month of Ramazan.

Raising slogans against the Punjab government and police, the activists carrying party flags, banners and placards marched through various streets demanding release of the detained activists.

Hyderabad MWM leaders Maulana Gul Hassan Murtazvi, Asim Mirza and others led the rally.

Speaking to the participants, they slammed the Punjab government’s “biased policy and attitude” towards their sect and alleged that the arrested activists were being harassed by the police.

They called for an immediate end to the crackdown, and warned of countrywide protest sit-ins against the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz government.

ASWJ protest

ASWJ activists, under the banner of the Sunni Action Committee, Hyderabad, staged a noisy demonstration outside the local press club to demand an immediate halt to the alleged crackdown on ASWJ activists in Ghotki and Khairpur districts.

Carrying party flags, banners and placards inscribed with slogans for the release of their arrested fellows, the activists raised slogans against the Ghotki and Khairpur police and condemned institution of ‘fake’ cases registered against them.

They said ASWJ activists were being arrested in both districts but the arrests of many of them were not being shown in the record of the police stations concerned.

Leading the participants, ASWJ leaders Asim Ali Shah, Abdul Ghaffar Shakir, Muharram Din Farooqui and others said that the party’s Ghotki president, Qari Mohammad Shaban Mehar, had been picked up by some policemen in plain clothes while he, along with his son, Umer Farooq, was going somewhere on a motorcycle in Ghotki on July 19. They alleged that the policemen forced him into their double-cabin vehicle and drove away. Since then, they added, he had been missing. They expressed their serious concern over the victim’s well-being.

Criticising Khairpur SSP Usman Ghani Siddiqui for ordering a crackdown on ASWJ activists within his jurisdiction, the leaders said the party’s Khairpur district leaders, Allama Sanaullah Haideri and Abdul Jabbar Farooqui, were arrested for leading a protest demonstration but were implicated in fake cases of armed robberies and other crimes.

They warned the SSP against resorting to such excesses, and said the ASWJ could not be crushed through such tactics.

They demanded an immediate ‘release’ of Allama Qari Mehar and arrested party activists, a halt to the crackdown, withdrawal of the ‘false’ cases and removal of the Khairpur SSP.

They vowed to intensify their protest if their demands were ignored.

Published in Dawn, August 2nd, 2014