ISLAMABAD, April 6 People's Rights Movement (PRM) has asked the parliament and the Supreme Court to take immediate action against “the killers of landless tenants in Okara” and evolve political will to discontinue the practice of land allotments to military personnel.

It has also demanded compensation for the families of the dead and injured, and immediate implementation of the promise to grant ownership rights to state land across Punjab to the tenants who have tilled it for decades.

A statement issued by the PRM pointed out that the incident that took place in the wee hours of Monday in Okara was misreported in some sections of the media as a clash between rival groups of Anjuman Mazarain Punjab.

In fact tenants of Kulyana Estate were “directly and brutally targeted by hired goons of those military officers who have had tenants' land illegally 'allotted' to themselves in recent times and are employing all sorts of gangsterism to evict the tenants from these lands,” the statement said.

The tenants, including women, were fired upon when they refused to cower in the face of intimidation. It said at least four tenants were killed in the incident, while more than 24 others suffered critical injuries.

The PRM noted that the AMP had waged a peaceful struggle for ownership rights to state land in Okara and other districts of Punjab in the face of considerable state repression for over eight years. It said the tenants, who were targeted, were helpless and without weapons and like in Swat and other parts of the NWFP, the state was “at best unable to stop such gangsterism and at worst was sponsoring it”.

The PRM said the Okara tenants staged a sit-in in Okara immediately after the shootings and only dispersed when the district police chief assured them that those responsible for the incident would be arrested.