THATTA, July 26: A 35-year-old man was shot dead outside his home in Thatta’s Kumbhar Mohalla, near the Makli Cooperative Housing Society, on Friday evening.
The victim, Rafique Jalbani, was a son of Dawn’s Senior Sub-editor Abbas Jalbani and associated with Christian Aid, a non-governmental organisation. Eyewitnesses sitting at a confectionary shop near the scene and a policeman on patrol said that a rashly driven blue 1000cc Suzuki Alto car entered a narrow lane leading to the victim’s house, stopped for a while and sped away.
The victim’s wife, Sindhu Memon, told Dawn that she was busy cooking in the kitchen when someone knocked at the door. She said she asked her husband to answer the knock. As soon as Rafique, her husband, opened the door, she heard two gunshots and rushed to the door.
“I was stunned to find him lying in a pool of blood. I rushed to neighbours for help.”
Sindhu Memon linked Rafique’s murder to “enemies he made” while working on Nur Goth Project, a 100-house scheme launched by the Pakistan Medical Association for internally displaced persons. “He resisted attempts by some officials to accommodate undeserving people in the scheme.”
Rafique Jalbani quit the organisation a few months ago.
She revealed that her husband had been receiving threatening calls from unknown people for the past few weeks. Aijaz Solangi, a friend of Rafique’s, corroborated her account.
Rafique Jalbani has a four-year-old son.
