KARACHI: A 50-year-old man was shot dead while another was wounded on the outskirts of the city on Wednesday, said police.

They added that unidentified suspects opened fire on the victims near Pareshan Chowk in Faqeera Goth.

As a result, Khalid Rind was gunned down while another unidentified person was wounded. The dead and the wounded were taken to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital.

SITE Superhighway Industrial Area SHO Gulzar Ali Tunio said that the police had got some clues about the motive of the murder, however, they were waiting for relatives to lodge an FIR with the police to formally launch a probe into the incident.

By-election security matters

A meeting was held at the headquarters of the Pakistan Rangers Sindh under the chair of DG Rangers, Maj Gen Iftikhar Husain Chaudhry, which reviewed overall law and order situation.

The participants in the meeting exchanged views about security arrangements for forthcoming NA-249 by-poll in Karachi (scheduled to be held today), religious gatherings in the province, Eidul Fitr, Covid-19 situation and other security matters.

They planned a coordinated strategy to tackle these challenges.

“The meeting discussed all matters to ensure implementation of the government orders and directions regarding Covid-19,” said a spokesperson.

The participants also reiterated their resolve to take all possible security steps to ensure protection of life and property of citizens.

In this regard, people were urged to demonstrate their national and moral responsibility and take care of each other in view of Covid-19.

Adopting precautions and following SOPs were considered imperative so that health staff, police and Rangers deployed for security and daily-wage earners should not become victims of this virus.

The meeting was attended by commissioner of Karachi, additional IG Karachi, add. IG Special Branch, add. IG CTD, joint DG IB, DIGs and senior officers of intelligence agencies.

‘Civic group hitman held’

The Pakistan Rangers and police jointly carried out an intelligence-based action in Pak Colony and arrested a suspect.

The held suspect, Mohammed Sajid Ali, was an alleged hitman and also involved in house robberies, said a Rangers spokesperson.

He belonged to a dacoits’ gang identified as ‘Honda Civic group’.

The Rangers claimed to have seized arms used in targeted killings and robberies from his possession.

During initial probe, the suspect ‘confessed’ that he was involved in targeted killings of “workers of his rival parties”.

He joined the Honda Civic group in 2015 and committed house robberies at gunpoint.

His accomplices namely Waseem alias Commando, Javed and Amin were arrested by police during a robbery in February 2021.

There were at least over one dozen FIRs registered against the held suspect.

Raids were being conducted for arrest of the group’s remaining members.

Published in Dawn, April 29th, 2021