PESHAWAR: Maulana Sufi Mohammad, the chief of the defunct Tehrik Nifaz-i-Shariat-i-Muhammadi, surfaced on Monday — two months after he mysteriously went missing in Amandarra, the headquarters of TNSM, in Malakand region.

Bakht Wahid, an immediate relative, told Dawn on phone that Sufi Mohammad had reached Peshawar in the afternoon, along with his family. However, he refused to disclose the place where the 80-year-old Maulana had been staying since April.

‘We don’t know where Maulana Sufi and his family were detained,’ Mr Wahid said, adding that he had been released along with his family.

A government official, however, expressed ignorance about the release of the TNSM chief. ‘We were neither privy to his arrest nor are we privy to his release,’ he said.

NWFP Information Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain was not available for comment.

Credible sources said that Sufi Mohammad and his family had been taken into protective custody after he mysteriously disappeared from his headquarters in Amandarra.

Sufi Mohammad and 12 members of his family had moved to Mirpur, Azad Kashmir, where security agencies had taken them into protective custody. He was kept at an unspecified place.

The government has been refusing to admit the detention of the cleric. Sufi’s son Rizwanullah called Dawn correspondent in Timergara and said his father had been released. He refused to give further details.

The government had released Sufi Mohammad last year in order to strike a deal with the Taliban for peace in Malakand region. He went missing before the launch of the military operation in Malakand. One of his sons was killed in action and another suffered injuries.

Sufi’s deputy Maulana Mohammad Alam and TNSM spokesman Amir Izzat Khan were killed when a military convoy taking them to Peshawar was attacked on Sakhakot road, in Malakand, last month.