KARACHI: With a Supreme Court bench scheduled to resume hearing in the Karachi law and order implementation case on Thursday, police on Wednesday claimed to have arrested two suspects wanted in a case pertaining to the gruesome murder of Lyari ‘gangster’ Arshad Pappu.

The arrest of Zubair Baloch, said to be a brother of banned People’s Amn Committee chief Uzair Jan Baloch, and Zakir Dada sparked protests in Lyari, where enraged people forced shopkeepers to pull down the shutters, blocked vehicular traffic on main roads and lit bonfires.

SSP-City Ahmed Jamal told a press conference that the police raided a bus terminal near Hub Chowki and arrested Zubair Baloch and Zakir Dada.

The suspects were fleeing Lyari to avoid capture. Zubair is Uzair Jan Baloch’s brother, he added.

He said that following the apex court’s suo motu notice the police carried out several raids and arrested four suspects in three raids nominated in the FIR regarding the killing of Arshad Pappu.

He said that the absconding suspects were Uzair Jan Baloch, Noor Mohammad alias Baba Ladla, his brother Zahid Ladla, Asif Kana, Faisal Pathan and Yasir Pathan.

Tension prevailed in Lyari and some other parts of the old city.

Residents in Lyari, Old Golimar, Malir, Muwach Goth and Mauripur took out rallies and chanted slogans against the arrest of Zubair and Zakir.

Last month, a five-judge SC bench headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry had issued notices to the inspector general of police and the advocate general on an application filed by Arshad Pappu’s wife and sister seeking registration of a case against members of the banned PAC, including Uzair Baloch, for killing Arshad Pappu and his brother and mutilating their bodies.

Earlier on March 17, the police confirmed that Arshad Pappu, his brother Yasir Arafat and a confidant, Juma Shera aka Shera Pathan, were killed in Lyari.

The police found the body of Shera Pathan only, while the bodies of Arshad Pappu and his brother were still not recovered, as the police believed that the bodies had already been mutilated, probably burnt, by rival gangsters.

The police said that Arshad Pappu had kidnapped Faiz Mohammad, father of Uzair Jan Baloch, a local transporter, for ransom and later killed him, mutilated his body and thrown it in a junkyard. After that, Uzair joined Pappu’s rival Rehman Dakait’s gang to avenge his father’s murder.