LAHORE: While Tehreek-i-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) chief Khadim Hussain Rizvi was in ‘protective custody’, a number of TLP workers were booked and arrested in different cases during a major crackdown across the country on Saturday.

The law-enforcement agencies, which launched the operation on Friday, intensified the crackdown ahead of their protest scheduled for Sunday in Islamabad for what the authorities said maintenance of law and order.

Federal Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry a day ago had declared through his Twitter account that the TLP chief had been taken “into protective custody by police and shifted to a guest house. They insisted to come to Rwp, refusing government’s proposal for alternative arrangements. It’s to safeguard public life, property and order and has to do nothing with Aasia Bibi case”.

Pir Afzal Qadri detained in Gujrat after he sought to lead protesters to Islamabad

However, a notification issued by Lahore deputy commissioner Saleha Saeed, which had recommended the arrest of TLP chief under the Punjab Maintenance of Public Order Ordinance 1960, did mention that Khadim Rizvi with his accomplices had been “instigating mobs against the verdict of the Supreme Court in Aasia Bibi case to challenge the writ of the state by damaging public property and creating panic among the masses. In this way, he has become a potential danger to public peace and law and order situation”.

During the operation against the TLP protesters on Saturday, the Lahore police registered two FIRs against TLP chief Rizvi and workers of the organisation under Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act. The FIRs accused the nominees of directing threats against the police and attacking law-enforcement personnel, as well as creating panic.

In one FIR registered with the Nawankot police station, the police nominated the TLP leader and 10 of the organisation’s office-bearers and followers, in addition to 35 unidentified men. In the other case registered with the Sherakot police station, over a dozen followers of Maulana Rizvi were nominated, in addition to 150 unidentified workers on the same charges.

In Gujrat, TLP leader Pir Afzal Qadri as well as party’s divisional and district presidents were taken into custody when they along with a caravan of over two dozen workers began travelling towards Islamabad to take part in the sit-in.

While Islamabad had seen lockdowns for weeks at least twice in recent years during the TLP protests, violent protests were witnessed in different parts of the country only last month against the acquittal of a Christian mother in a blasphemy case.

As law-enforcement agencies arrested hundreds of TLP activists and workers during the current operation in Punjab, clashes occurred in Lahore, Sheikhupura, Gujranwala and Faisalabad where charged protesters pelted the police with stones.

A 23-year-old TLP worker, Rehan, died when a stray bullet hit him during the agitation at Kot Abdul Malik. He was among the protesters who had blocked the road.

Law enforcers arrested over 250 people in Faisalabad, 200 in Gujranwala, and 150 in Rawalpindi, 82 in Kasur, 70 in Sheikhupura, 30 in Bahawalpur, 24 in Sahiwal and 53 in Sialkot, said a senior police officer who supervised the operation.

As protests also spread to parts of Karachi, police arrested 154 TLP workers during the operation. Most of the workers were taken into custody when they staged protest sit-ins against the arrest of the TLP chief. Officials said most were booked under terrorism charges, while three workers suffered gunshot wounds allegedly during a clash on the M.A. Jinnah Road, a main thoroughfare near the Quaid-i-Azam mausoleum.

In all, 334 workers of the group were arrested in different parts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.

Published in Dawn, November 25th, 2018