KARACHI: The city started limping back to normality on Saturday after the killing of 73 people in the four days of violence as the brutal trend of gunny bags-stuffed bodies following brief kidnappings and torture apparently came to a halt, police said.
Though five more people were killed in overnight armed attacks, no major incident occurred in the day. Tension, however, persisted in the affected parts of Korangi after the Friday armed assault on police.
At least four policemen were killed and several others wounded when a bus they were travelling in came under an armed attack near Korangi 2½. All policemen were armed and in plain clothes and were heading towards Chakra Goth.
A young man was found shot dead in Shadman Town in the small hours of Saturday.
An official at the Shahrah-i-Noor Jehan police station said the body was found near Qalandria Chowk. The man was clad in pants and shirt. The victim could not be identified till late in the night.
A bus conductor was gunned down when armed men fired upon his vehicle in Orangi Town.
The area police said that the minibus of route Z came under an armed attack near Dabba Chowk in Sector 11½. The conductor, 30-year-old Faqeer Muhammad, sustained bullet wounds and died.
“He was a resident of Baloch Colony in Orangi Town and father of four. The bus was attacked by four men on two motorbikes,” said an official at the Iqbal Market police station.
A Pakistan Air Force (PAF) official was also killed in the Malir area earlier in the morning.
The police said the victim, Ghazanfar Ali, in his early-30s, sustained a bullet wound in Khokhrapar No. 3.
“He was shifted to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre for treatment, where he died. The incident appears quite mysterious as the victims was a PAF employee and posted in the interior of Sindh. We are still not convinced about the purpose of his visit to a suburban area of the city,” said Inspector Shafqat Chandio, the SHO of the Khokhrapar police station.
He, however, ruled out that killing was a result of any mugging attempt, saying all valuables, including cash and a cellphone, were intact when the victim was shifted to the JPMC.
An hour before sunrise a ragpicker was found shot dead in Federal B Area.
The police said the body of 35-year-old Gul Alam was found near a known eatery in Federab B Area’s block 15.
“He was a resident of a katchi abadi near Syeda Manzil in block 5. He was hit by five bullets,” said an official at the Jauharabad police station.
Another young man was found dead in the Mochko area of Lyari.
Official said the victim, who remained unidentified, was found shot dead near the L-5 bus terminal in Islam Nagar.
The figures compiled by the police suggested that 73 people had been killed in four days of violence that triggered on Wednesday evening. “On Aug 17, a total of 17 people were killed in different incidents,” said an official. “On Aug 18, some 29 killings were reported while 22 people met the same fate on Aug 19 and five on Aug 20. The victims included a teenage girl and two minor boys. The number of people wounded is over 70.”
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