KARACHI, June 19: Parts of the city’s district central including North Karachi witnessed a shutterdown on Tuesday as three Muttahida Qaumi Movement workers and a religious scholar were laid to rest.

The three activists — Syed Hassan Raza, Atif Usmani and Mohammad Ejtaba, all residents of North Karachi — were shot dead on Monday and their bodies were found in a car parked on Mirza Adam Khan Road in Lyari.

The religious scholar, Maulana Ghulam Muhammad Amini, a prayer leader at Masjid Noor-i-Eman, was also shot dead in Nazimabad No 3 the same day.

Namaz-i-Janaza for MQM workers was offered in the Sir Syed Ground, North Karachi, and for the scholar in the Rizvia Imambargah on Tuesday.

Intermittent gunfire was reported in North Karachi and some other areas of the district central where routine life was affected and commercial activities remained suspended.

Heavy contingents of police and Rangers were deployed in sensitive localities to prevent  any untoward incident.

Participants in the MQM activists’ funeral procession raised slogans against Lyari gangsters who, they alleged, were involved in the victims’ killing.

The funeral was attended by MQM leaders Dr Sagheer Ahmed, Khwaja Izharul Hassan, Wassay Jalil, Hammad Siddiqui and a large number of party workers, besides relatives of the victims.

The victims were later buried in the Shah Mohammad graveyard.

Hassan was an employee of the Karachi Water and Sewerage Board and Atif, father of two, was a factory worker. Ejtabah worked in a private bank and was about to get married.

An FIR No.147/12 was registered on the complaint of Javed Hussain, the younger bother of Hassan Raza, against unidentified persons.

Tension also gripped Nazimabad, Rizvia, Liaquatabad, Shahrah-i-Pakistan and Ancholi when funeral of Maulana Amini took place after Zuhar prayers on Tuesday.

All shops and markets in the areas were shut.

Three motorcycles were torched near Ayesha Manzil and Naseerabad while the funeral procession was passing through Shahrah-i-Pakistan, police said. Later, the religious scholar was laid to rest in Wadi-i-Hussain graveyard on the Superhighway.

Mourners chanted slogans against the killing of Maulana Amini and demanded immediate arrest of the culprits.

Police and Rangers were deployed along the procession route to avert any untoward incident.

Police sources claimed to have detained three persons allegedly involved in rioting during the funeral.

Maulana Amini was shot dead when he was returning home in Gulbahar after offering Maghrib prayers. He sustained three bullets wounds on different parts of his body.

No case was registered till late Tuesday evening.