LARKANA, Feb 25: The people of Qambar observed a complete strike on the third consecutive day on Friday, pressing the Sindh government to rename the Shahdadkot district as Qambar and arrest all police personnel involved in killing four protesters.
Schoolteachers and students supporting the demands of the Citizen's Action Committee boycotted classes and joined the protest sit-in at the Chowk-i-Shuhda. The situation turned tense when transporters from Shahdadkot took away two protestors, Wahab Hakro and Abdullah Hakro, who had pelted vehicles with stones.
The protestors in the lead of Bhao Dur Mohammed Buriro, the chairman of CAC, marched on the Qambar police station and asked the SHO to recover the boys or be ready for the consequences.
The SHO immediately rushed to Shahdadkot town and released the boys from transporters after which the protesters dispersed peacefully. The transporters pressed for registering of FIR against the protestors. However, they agreed for a truce when Nawab Shabir Ahmed Chandio intervened to decide the matter. Speaking on the occasion, Bhao Buriro, Nazeer Tunio and Qurban Rajpar urged the government to stop turning deaf ear to demands of the people of Qambar.
They demanded that all police officials nominated in the FIR for allegedly killing four persons be arrested. They criticized Sindh chief minister's advisor Sultan Khuhawar for changing the name of the district for his benefit.
ACCOUNTS OFFICE: The entire staff of the district accounts office stopped all transactions here on Friday to protest against the arrest of an assistant accounts officer and a sub-accountant by officials of the anti-corruption establishment.
The staff, protesting over what they called 'excess' of the ACE officials in arresting assistant accounts officer Altaf Hussain Mangi and sub-accountant Ghulam Mustafa Lashari in connection with a bank fraud case, staged a sit-in outside the office, demanding release of their colleagues.
Showing the office order of the principal of the Chandka Medical College and a cheque amounting to Rs2,060,000 issued against the account of the Hesco (revenue), they asserted that all formalities were fully observed and no fraud was committed.
They alleged that the ACE was unnecessarily harassing the staff and implicating them in what they called a 'false' case. Their leaders threatened to continue the strike till their colleagues was released.
The ACE also arrested Ghulam Abbas Buledi, a clerk at the Chandka Medical College, on suspicion of involvement in the alleged fraud. However, Altaf Hussain was released after certain formalities.
The district accounts officer claimed that the ACE had taken Altaf away only to record his statement in this connection. Meanwhile, the anti-corruption police produced Ghulam Mustafa and Ghulam Abbas before a judicial magistrate and remanded them to police custody for seven days for further questioning.
The pen-down strike by the district accounts staff has generated resentment among government employees, whose pay bills are normally routed through the office.