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FAISALABAD, Jan 15: The federal government has reportedly constituted special teams to collect details of the bank accounts, income and expenditure documents of the banned jihadi outfits so that the same could be frozen.
Sources told this correspondent on Tuesday that heads of law-enforcement agencies have been directed to immediately depute experienced personnel for the minute checking of record and other material taken into custody during raids on the offices of Lashkar-i-Taiba, Jaish-i-Muhammad, Sipah-i-Sahaba and Tehrik-i-Jafaria.
It was learnt that intelligence agencies were checking the record of the registrars offices so that properties owned by banned groups could be confiscated. The office-bearers of these bodies would also be asked to provide details about their sources of income and expenditure.
They said that bank accounts and properties of the office-bearers of religious organizations were also being collected by the intelligence agencies.
Meanwhile, police teams raided over a dozen houses and offices of religious leaders in the city on Monday night but failed to arrest anyone.
Despite the passage of three days, no case has so far been registered by the local police against over a 100 arrested activists of the banned bodies.
CONDEMNED: The Pak-Afghan Defence Council, the Jamiat Ahle Hadith Pakistan and the Jamaat-i-Islami have condemned the arrests of religious leaders and activists and demanded the government not to play in the hands of anti-Islam forces.
Talking to newsmen here at a formal meeting on Monday night, central leader of Pak-Afghan Defence Council Sahibzada Tariq Mahmood alleged that the country was in a serious crisis due to tension on borders and financial constraints but the rulers were playing in the hands of foreign powers.
Criticizing the government for banning the Lashkar-i-Taiba and the Jaish-i-Muhammad, he said the act vindicated India’s claim that Pakistan was involved in cross-border terrorism.
The Sahibzada confessed that some so-called religious bodies were involved in the killing of poor people. The government should find the causes which forced the poor to take up gun and take action against the real culprits who provided funds and arms to them to achieve their nefarious designs.
He claimed that the Lashkar-i-Taiba and the Jaish-i-Muhammad were not terrorist organizations. If the step was in the right direction, then first of all MQM should be banned which murdered thousands of innocent people in Karachi, he added.
Jamaat-i-Islami city amir Mahboobuz Zaman Butt criticized the military regime and termed the imposition of ban on religious groups a cowardly step.
He said the Indian nation was being prepared to fight against Pakistan but Pakistani rulers were arresting respectable people only to disgrace seminaries. He termed the step an American conspiracy to pressurize both Pakistan and India only to set up its military base in the region, he added.
Jamiat Ahle Hadith Pakistan regional chief Maulana Yousaf Anwar said big powers backed the Indian government only to divert the attention of world media from killings of innocent people in occupied Kashmir, Afghanistan and Palestine.
He said time has come for the Muslim world to play their role for safeguarding the rights of Muslims.
Meanwhile, local leaders of the PML(QA), the Sunni Tehrik, various NGOs and elected representatives in their separate statements appreciated the government move to launch a crackdown against the banned militant groups.
