KARACHI: Investigators inquiring into the murder of the elder son of former senator Allama Abbas Kumaili concluded on Sunday that the killing was carried out on sectarian grounds.

Allama Ali Akbar Kumaili, 40, was shot dead in an Azizabad area outside his ice factory on Saturday.

“We have got some significant leads regarding the murder, which suggest that it was linked with the recent spate of sectarian killings in the metropolis,” said Karachi police chief Ghulam Qadir Thebo.

Initially, the police thought that the cleric’s killing might have some political dimensions as his father had been a senator of the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, he added.

The city police chief said Ali Akbar Kumaili was also active in prisons, where he provided religious education to inmates. That aspect was also being investigated, he added. He said the police deputed 20 guards and a mobile van for the security of Senator Kumaili and his family, but at the time of the incident, only two private guards were with the young Kumaili.

He said it appeared that the assailants did complete recce before carrying out the attack.

He said Ali Akbar travelled in a bulletproof car, but he was standing outside his ice factory in Bhangoria Goth when the assailants targeted him.

He said he could not confirm a claim made by a proscribed militant outfit, Jundullah, that it was behind the cleric’s killing. However, he said two banned outfits had joined hands in the city and, therefore, the sectarian killings registered a steep rise.

Police official Raja Umer Khattab, who heads the counter-terrorism unit of the CID, said the Jundullah had re-emerged in the metropolis after a lull.

“This Jundullah is a Karachi-based [militant] group and it has nothing to do with another Jundallah which allegedly operates in Iran,” he said.

Laid to rest

Representatives of political and religious parties, Shia organisations and a large number of people attended the funeral prayer of Ali Akbar Kumaili held at the Numaish traffic intersection on M. A. Jinnah Road. Allama Razi Jafar Naqvi led the namaz-i-janaza.

The coffin was taken to the Lyari area for burial. He was laid to rest in the Ali Bagh graveyard amid moving scenes.

Later, former interior minister and Pakistan Peoples Party leader Rahman Malik paid a visit to Allama Abbas Kumaili’s residence to offer his condolence.

Muttahida Qaumi Movement leader and Sindh health minister Dr Sagheer Ahmed also visited his residence and offered his condolence.

MWM demands army operation in city

The Majlis Wahdat-i-Muslimeen demanded on Sunday that an army operation be launched in Karachi immediately on the pattern of North Waziristan, as the killing of Allama Ali Akbar Kumaili had exposed the hollow claims of success of the ongoing targeted operation.

“The Sindh government and its law enforcement agencies have miserably failed to curb terrorism in the city of the Quaid, while the district central has become a stronghold for religious and political Taliban,” said MWM leader Allama Amin Shaheedi.

Talking to reporters after attending the funeral prayers of Ali Akbar Kumaili, he said all patriotic political and religious parties should play their role in the elimination of terrorism and to restore peace to the country, including Karachi.

He said the Sindh government should announce the failure of the so-called targeted operation in the city and hand over Karachi to the army so that it could launch a Waziristan-like operation.

He said the law enforcement agencies knew the killers and their hideouts but were avoiding taking action against them.

Published in Dawn, September 8th, 2014