KARACHI: Faisal Raza Abidi, former Pakistan Peoples Party senator, was picked up from his Karachi residence in the early hours of Saturday morning and was being grilled for his alleged involvement in certain cases of sectarian killings in the city, official sources said.

Heavy contingents of police and Rangers raided Mr Abidi’s house in New Rizvia Society, took him into custody and shifted him to an undisclosed location.

During the day, a senior police officer told Dawn that the ex-senator was formally arrested in a case pertaining to the killing of two members of the Tableeghi Jamaat. “We have arrested Faisal Abidi for his alleged involvement in the double murder case,” said SP Jamshed Quarters Tahir Noorani.

But in the evening, a top-ranking police officer said that Mr Abidi was “detained” and being investigated in some previous cases of sectarian killings. “He will be released if found innocent,” he said, asking not to be named.

Sources told Dawn that the issue of his “arrest” also came under discussion at a high-level meeting chaired by Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah to review the breakdown of law and order in the city.

They said that the police authorities informed the CM that he was picked up on suspicion of being a “facilitator” in some cases of sectarian killings. The CM told them that it was their job to take such action against any suspect and all he cared about was the result.

Mr Abidi’s arrest triggered a strong reaction on the social media and by late evening #FaisalRazaAbidi was trending on Twitter.

The Majlis Wahdat-i-Muslimeen and even the Altaf Hussain-led Muttahida Qaumi Movement also condemned the arrest and demanded his immediate release.

Scores of MWM workers and sympathisers staged sit-ins on two major arteries — M. A. Jinnah Road and Shahrah-i-Pakistan — in protest over the arrest and condemned the Sindh government and law enforcement agencies for “supporting” banned outfits.

Once considered a staunch loyalist to former president Asif Zardari who made him the president of the Karachi chapter of the PPP and then a member of the upper house of parliament, Mr Abidi developed differences with his party over certain issues and eventually resigned from the Senate in 2014. Since then, he is believed to have unofficially left the PPP.

PPP leader Senator Saeed Ghani, however, said that Mr Abidi was expelled from the party. “I will not make any comment on his arrest as he is being investigated.”

Since mid-2015, sources said, he got close to the MQM’s London-based supremo, appeared in many TV talk shows and spoke against what he called an anti-MQM operation. He was also very vocal against the former Karachi mayor Mustafa Kamal-led Pak Sarzameen Party.

Published in Dawn, November 6th, 2016