SUKKUR: Activists of Qaumi Awami Tehreek (QAT) took out rallies in Kandhkot and Jacobabad on Friday in protest against razing of old villages and occupation on their lands by Bahria Town Karachi and registration of cases against leaders of Sindhi nationalists in the wake of violent protest against the housing society.

Lawyers also boycotted court proceedings in Jacobabad and Larkana to protest QAT chief Ayaz Latif Palijo’s arrest.

The rallies in Kandhkot and Jacobabad marched to the respective press clubs where the leaders made speeches and said the Bahria Town chief Malik Riaz in collusion with Pakistan Peoples Party and Sindh government was recklessly razing villages in rural areas of Karachi and occupying their land but the Sindh government had not registered even a single case so far against the administration of Bahria Town.

They raised questions over PPP leadership’s silence over demolition of villages. When Sindhi people held peaceful protests in support of the uprooted villagers the PPP and Sindh government registered “fake” cases under terrorism charges against nationalist leaders Ayaz Latif Palejo, Dr Qadir Magsi, Jalal Mehmood Shah, Sanan Qureshi, Riaz Chandio and others and arrested them to appease Malik Riaz.

They also slammed acute and deliberate shortage of irrigation water in Sindh and said the rulers had deliberately created shortage of water to irrigate their own lands and the lands of waderas who wielded votes for the PPP.

They appealed to chief justice of Sindh High Court to order withdrawal of “fake” cases registered against the nationalist leaders and their release, and departments concerned to take legal action against PPP leaders involved in water theft.

Lawyers boycott courts

Jacobabad District Bar Asso­ciation boycotted courts’ proceedings against registration of case against QAT chief Ayaz Latif Palijo as well as against murder of a lawyer Asmatullah Kasi in Quetta on Friday.

Wearing black armbands DBA leaders Muzaffar Ali Rind, G.M. Soomro, Roshan Kundrani, Misri Jakhrani and others condemned registration of FIR against QAT chief and said the Sindh government was taking action against Sindhis to please Malik Riaz, which was unacceptable and unbearable.

They said that advocate Asmatullah Kasi was innocent. Lawyers’ murder in a democratic era was beyond understanding, they said.

They demanded withdrawal of fake cases registered against QAT chief and said Kasi’s killers be arrested immediately, otherwise they would widen their protest.

LARKANA: Lawyers on Friday boycotted courts’ proceedings in protest against murder of senior advocate Asmatullah in Quetta and registration of cases against Sajjad Chandio, member of Sindh Bar Council, Ayaz Latif Palijo and many others in Bahria Town violence case.

After the boycott, office-bearers of High Court Bar Association Larkana circuit, and district bar associations later demonstrated on the DBA premises and condemned murder of senior lawyer in Quetta.

They demanded immediate arrest of the lawyer’s killers and said the lawyers’ community would launch countrywide protests. Implicating senior advocates, who had raised voice against Bahria Town’s illegal occupation and razing of old settlements, had exposed PPP government’s credibility, they said.

They said that even during dictator’s regimes cases against protesters had not been registered under anti-terrorism act. This was what they called it a nexus between Sindh government and the owner of Bahria Town.

They urged the government to cancel cases against lawyers.

Published in Dawn, June 12th, 2021