KARACHI, Dec 1: Even after DNA profiles were created from unidentified body parts recovered from the site of the Oct 18 Karsaz bombings, over 20 victims of the tragedy remain unidentified since the police do not consider it part of their job to inform the affected families, the PPP remains unaware of the fact that the profiles are ready and no relative of people missing since Ms Bhutto’s homecoming has approached the laboratory authorities, Dawn has learnt.
Meanwhile, family members of people suspected —but not confirmed — to have been killed in the suicide bombings desperately await the closure that does not appear to be forthcoming.
According to a senior official of the Dr A.Q. Khan Institute of Biotechnology and Genetic Engineering, the profiles resulting from DNA tests were prepared as fast as possible and their availability was conveyed to the relevant authorities. The next step ought to have been bringing in family members of people missing since Oct 18, so that their DNA could be matched with that of the body parts recovered from the blast site. However, the results of the expensive DNA tests lie unused in the laboratory and have not been employed for the identification purposes for which they were commissioned. “Our institute has prepared the results of up to 30 DNA tests but no one has approached us to match them with family members of the untraced persons,” said Dr Syed Qasim Mehdi, the director-general of the institute. “We have offered these services in the past and this time, too, we put in our best efforts and did not even charge any fees for these tests that cost thousands of dollars to carry out.”
Dr Mehdi conceded that if the DNA profiles were not matched with the family members of the missing people, there would be little point in having conducted the tests in the first place.
These tests were conducted by the laboratory, which operates under the umbrella of Karachi University, on body parts collected from the scene of the Oct 18 carnage. This is the second time this task has been officially commissioned in Karachi since the same was done after the Nishtar Park bombing last year. Before that, DNA profiling facilities were available only at the Biomedical and Genetic Engineering Division of Khan Research Laboratories, Islamabad.
The existence of this modern facility has so far failed to prove useful to the families affected by the Karsaz tragedy. The police have made no significant progress in terms of investigating the bombings. Meanwhile, the force has also distanced itself from the task of tracing and informing the families that are already on their records as those of people suspected to have been killed in the bombings.
“We are not responsible for informing those people,” Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) Azhar Ali Farooqui told Dawn. “If anyone approached us, we would certainly take them for DNA matching. But no one has asked the police for assistance along these lines.”
According to the CCPO, no progress has been made in identifying the suicide bombers either. It may be recalled that the suspected bombers’ heads were found on the site and the police released photographs of them a few days after the bombings.
The police force’s refusal to help establish the identities of the victims comes as a severe blow to the estimated 22 families who depend on the investigators to find their lost relatives.
Posters headlined ‘Missing’ pasted across the city reflect the desperation of Malik Rizwan Awan’s family, for example, which still hopes that Rizwan may be found alive. With his elder brother, the 20-year-old resident of Gulshan-i-Iqbal was amongst the hundreds of thousands of people who gathered to welcome the leader of the Pakistan People’s Party, Benazir Bhutto, on Oct 18. Rizwan has been missing since the bombings and over a month later, his family is desperate for news of his whereabouts, or a confirmation as to his death.
“We are in touch with the police station in our area,” said Farooq Awan, the elder brother of Rizwan who was with him at the time of the tragedy but survived. “The police tell us only that the results of the DNA tests have not yet been compiled and it may take time. We don’t depend too much on the police, though, because of some bad experiences, so we’ve made efforts on our own as well.”
Talking about his mother, who is still in a state of shock and immense grief, Farooq said that even if the family learned that Rizwan had died, it would bring some closure and lead the family towards acceptance. As the matter now stands, there is only uncertainty about Rizwan, who was the youngest of four brothers and three sisters.
While many more families in Karachi suffer as that of Rizwan, the PPP appears to have turned its attention towards preparing for the upcoming polls, even though the party aggressively pursued the investigations of the case for the first few days.
Busy unveiling its manifesto and lobbying political parties to contest the expected Jan 8 elections, the party leadership is not aware of the stage at which investigations now stand in the case. While the Karachi PPP president Rashid Rabbani said that “we are very concerned about our missing people,” he went on to say that “the fact is that the DNA test report has not been prepared yet. As soon as we get the report, we will approach the families of our missing people.”
When informed by Dawn that the test results have been ready for over a week, he said that the authorities had not informed the PPP which, he added, was in close contact with the Sindh home department and the other institutions concerned.
Mr Rabbani’s comments are indicative of the level of communication and coordination between the PPP and the governmental authorities. While the police force refuses to help trace the families of the missing people and the PPP fails to keep itself abreast of developments, families such as those of Rizwan can only wait for a miracle.
“We are very disappointed with the attitude of both the PPP and the police,” said Farooq Awan, whose brother is missing. “I will approach the police again with the information that the DNA results are ready to be matched. I won’t wait any longer for anyone to contact me. We want to trace our brother and in this modern age, it should be a simple task.”
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