KARACHI: A week after the murder of his son, the custodian of an imambargah was also shot dead in Korangi, police said on Wednesday.

The Awami Colony police said Safdar Hussain, 60, was killed by unknown assailants near Sughra Imambargah in Korangi No 4 late on Tuesday night.

Korangi SSP Tariq Nawaz said that the victim was the imambargah’s mutawali, but his murder had nothing to do with this.

He claimed that the victim was killed by robbers when they attempted to snatch his mobile phone and he put up resistance.

Giving details, area SHO Jamal Leghari said that Mr Hussain and three other persons were sitting near his home when two armed motorcyclists emerged there, held them at gunpoint and demanded their cell phones.

In Gulshan-i-Maymar, armed muggers kill engineer, take away cell phone, laptop and cash

He said that one of the suspects took mobile phones from two of the four persons and in the meantime Mr Hussain and another person tried to overpower him.

Seeing this, his accomplice got off the motorbike and opened straight fire on them, and rode away with two snatched mobile phones.

He suffered critical bullet wounds and was taken to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre where doctors pronounced him dead. He was shot multiple times in the head.

The SHO said deceased’s son Azhar Husain was also gunned down by armed robbers in Korangi on May 10.

He claimed that the police had gunned down two suspects in an encounter when they were fleeing after killing Azhar.

Father of five killed by robbers

A 42-year-old man was shot dead by robbers in Ahsanabad on Wednesday morning, police said.

The SITE-Superhighway Industrial Area police said that Abdul Basit was killed in Mashriq Society.

The body was shifted to the Abbasi Shaheed Hospital for medico-legal formalities.

As the police appeared reluctant to share details about the incident, his relatives told the media at the hospital that Basit was an AutoCAD engineer who worked in a private company.

He left his residence in Gulshan-i-Maymar for work when two robbers, riding a motorbike, held him at gunpoint and snatched his mobile phone and wallet. As they attempted to snatch his laptop, the victim put up resistance and the robbers opened fire and rode away.

The victim was father of five children.

Published in Dawn, May 18th, 2023