THATTA, Jan 27: Raiders, apparently in search of treasure, dug up graves at a Mughal-era graveyard in Miran Pir, near the hilly terrain of Jherruck along the Thatta-Hyderabad section of the National Highway, and caused damage to the heritage of historical importance, it emerged on Sunday.

The news spread like wildfire in Makli, Thatta, Jherruck, Bhanbore and other towns. Sindh Minister for Culture Sassui Palijo ordered a team of officials to rush to the site and assess the damage, besides investigating the matter.

A joint team of the archaeology and culture departments headed by Director-General of Culture Dr Mohammed Ali Manjhi visited the specified place and found one grave fully and another one partially dug up. Bones of a human skeleton were also found scattered around the damaged graves.

Dr Manjhi, who was accompanying Bhanbore ruins curator Abdul Fatah Shaikh and a number of officials associated with the culture and archaeology departments during the inspection told Dawn that the raiders seemed to be in search of some sort of treasure they believed was buried in the graveyard, presumably with the dead.

Assessing the damage in their attempt to find a clue to the raiders and their intentions, the officials inspected the richly-carved yellow stones inscribed with Persian poetry and Quranic versus uprooted from the graves. They said the stones belonging to two graves were partially damaged. However, there was no evidence of the raiders having taken away anything from the graveyard.

Dr Manjhi said that the graveyard dating back the Mughal era was 350 to 400 years old and had graves of known and unknown people of Baloch, Kalmati, Lashari, Palari and other tribes.

Thatta Deputy Commissioner Mohammed Nawaz Khoso, who joined the team later along with Assistant Commissioner Mushtaque Jatoi, the taluka mukhtiarkar and some other revenue officials, said that an irreparable loss had been caused to the historical site.

He told Dawn that an FIR under section 297 of the Pakistan Penal Code had been registered against unknown raiders at the Jherruck police station on a complaint lodged by Bhanbore Curator Mr Shaikh.

Mr Shaikh asked the authorities concerned to mobilise the police for immediate arrest of the culprits. He called for setting up of a permanent police post at the site to check such incidents.

Dr Manjhi, in reply to a question, said that the Miran Pir graveyard did not come under the ambit of the culture department and, as such, his department was not the custodian of the historical site. He said he would formally request the Sindh government to give the entire graveyard under the control of the department with a view to ensure preservation and security of the historical site.