DADU: A Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) activist was arrested after police claimed to have rescued his family members and relatives whom he held hostage at gunpoint for 15 hours over some matrimonial matter late on Saturday evening.

PML-N district chief Ali Nawaz Rind was booked at the B-Section police station on Sunday for holding his wife, sister-in-law, two nieces and four children for 15 hours at his Zulfikar Colony house before police intervened and managed to get the hostages freed following a shoot-out with him.

A joint team of the CIA, women and B-Section police took part in the action, officials at the local police station said. They said the action was taken on an SOS call made to them by Mr Rind’s niece Parveen Rind, who said her uncle was forcing her to marry against her freewill and held all people at home hostage to impose his own will on the adult ones.

The police claim was quickly rejected by the suspect’s senior party colleague Mohammad Usman Jamali and Awami Ittehad (AI) general secretary Syed Zafar Ali Shah who held an emergency press conference hours after the arrest to condemn “political victimisation” of Mr Rind.

They, along with some relatives of Mr Rindh, termed the police version a “concocted story” and alleged that police brought him and all inmates of the house to the police station and forced Parveen Rind to lodge an FIR against him. The police also registered another FIR claiming seizure of an unlicensed pistol from him, they added.

They recalled that only a couple of days back, the PML-N, PTI, PPP-SB and AI had announced an electoral alliance against the PPP in Dadu district. “The police were used to teach the PML-N a lesson,” they claimed, and urged Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to take notice of the “victimisation”.

A public protest would be held against the police excesses on Monday, they said.

Published in Dawn, November 9th, 2015

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