KARACHI, July 9: A religious scholar was kidnapped and subsequently shot dead by unidentified people in Orangi Town on Saturday morning. Police found the body near Metro cinema in Mominabad in the morning and shifted it to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital, where the victim was identified as Sheikhul Hadith Shamsuddin, 65. Police termed it a target killing. He was the principal of Madressah Darul Uloom Hanifia in Sector 11-E of Orangi Town.

According to the police, he used to offer morning prayers in the boys section of the madressah and taught the students there. Later, he used to walk to the nearby girls section for teaching. On Saturday morning, he left the boys section but did not reach the other section. It perturbed the female students, who inquired about him and reported the matter to the police.

Police said that Qari Shamsuddin might have been kidnapped on his way to the seminary and taken to an unknown place, where he was shot dead. They suspect that the body was later dumped near the cinema.

The news about his death spread like a wildfire in the locality and pupils took to the street to condemn the killing of their teacher. They pelted vehicles with stones blocking the roads. The protest demonstrations were not confined to Sector 11-E, as it widely spread across the town.

The law enforcers reached the troubled spot and baton-charged the protesters, who had blocked the roads.