KARACHI: The administrative judge of the antiterrorism courts in Karachi on Tuesday remanded four suspects in police custody in a case pertaining to the murder of former Muttahida Qaumi Movement MNA Ali Raza Abidi.

Investigating Officer Ali Haider of the Counter-Terrorism Department produced Mohammad Farooq, Abdul Haseeb, Mohammad Ghazali and Abu Bakar before the administrative judge of the ATCs for remand.

He submitted that the suspects belonged to one of the several criminal gangs operating in Lyari and their four accomplices — Bilal, Hasnain, Faizan and Mustafa — were still at large.

He sought their custody for two weeks to arrest their absconding accomplices, further questioning and to unearth their involvement in other cases.

The administrative judge remanded the suspects for four days in CTD custody and directed the IO to produce them again along with a progress report on March 9.

The remand papers said that initially police arrested Farooq and later other suspects were also apprehended in a Lyari locality on a lead provided by the detained suspect.

According to the prosecution, 46-year-old Abidi, former MNA and leader of a faction of the MQM, was shot dead by armed pillion riders in an attack on his vehicle near his residence in Defence Housing Authority, Phase-V, on Dec 25, 2018.

Earlier, investigators had claimed to have identified the killers and their facilitators and that the killing appeared to be motivated by political considerations.

However, the remand papers were silent about the motive behind the former MNA’s assassination.

Published in Dawn, March 6th, 2019