KARACHI: Police have launched a probe into the death of Bilal Khan, a 19-year-old 12th grade student who died during the alleged crossfire between a raiding team of police and drug peddlers in Gadap on Saturday morning and was laid to rest on Sunday.

A passerby, Shakeel, also got injured during the firing and is under treatment at the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital.

“An FIR has been registered on the complaint of victim’s mother and we have initiated an investigation,” said East Zone DIG Amir Farooqi, who is heading the probe team formed by Additional IG Karachi Dr Amir Ahmed Shaikh to ascertain the circumstances which led to the death of the student and fix responsibility.

Mr Farooqi added that no protest was reported from the area on Sunday after the funeral prayers of the victim.

The Gadap City police have registered FIR (155/2018) under Sections 302 (murder) and 34 (common intention) of the Pakistan Penal Code.

The complainant, Ms Shina Bibi, in her statement said she was at her home when she heard sound of firing at around 11:00am. In the meantime, her son Bilal went out of the house. She added that when she raised voice to ask her son to come inside the house, bullets fired from an unknown direction hit him and killed him on the spot.

The mother further said the ‘unknown persons’ gunned her son down for ‘unknown reasons’.

DIG Farooqi said, “Three spent bullet casings recovered from the crime scene are from a 9mm pistol, four from a 30-bore pistol and two from a submachine gun. We are still waiting for the report by the medico-legal officer.”

‘High velocity weapon’ used

The post-mortem examination of the deceased student was carried out at the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital on Saturday evening.

Additional police surgeon Dr Saleem Shaikh on Sunday told Dawn that the student sustained two bullets but there were three entry and exit wounds on his body.

“One bullet hit his left arm and pierced through it. Another bullet also hit his left arm which travelled through his chest and exit from the right side of his chest.

“There were three entry and exit wounds, which suggested that a high velocity weapon was used,” opined Dr Saleem Shaikh.

Separately, the Gadap police have registered another FIR (152/2018) against some nominated suspects and several other unknown persons on terror and other charges.

The complainant, SITE Superhighway Industrial Area SHO Humayun Ahmed, said two police teams — one led by him and the other by Memon Goth DSP — along with two companies of Rapid Response Force conducted a raid in the Gadap area over information provided by a ‘special informer’ about the presence of drugs and illegal weapons.

The complainant SHO in his statement said they considered such information ‘credible’ and when they conducted the raid at the place in Khilji Goth near Kochi Camp, popularly known as Afghan Camp where refugees resided, the drug peddlers opened fire on the police party. Resultantly, the bullets hit the police van and caused injury to a passerby, who later died.

The Gadap City police have registered one more FIR (153/2018) on the complaint of the same SHO, Humayun Ahmed, over recovery of drugs.

Meanwhile, Malir SSP Sheeraz Nazeer told Dawn that the police had arrested two suspects during the action on Saturday.

“One of them was released later due to lack of evidence while the other one, Izat Khan, is still in detention. He is an alleged drug peddler who was also arrested in the past on criminal charges,” the SSP said.

Published in Dawn, August 27th, 2018