KARACHI: The Sindh government has announced to constitute a fresh inquiry committee under DIG Abdul Khaliq Shaikh to investigate murder of two Hindu brothers in Umerkot and asked it to submit its report within five days. The provincial government has also assured to provide cash compensation and a government job to three Hindus — two trader brothers and third one who was a key witness of the twin murders and had later committed suicide.
This was decided at a meeting of the representatives committee of the Hindu community with Sindh Chief Minister Syed Qaim Ali Shah at C. M. House here on Thursday. The committee had earlier signed a written agreement with the Government-appointed Committee on Saturday for solving problems of Hindus, when thousands of non-Muslims from Umerkot and parts of Sindh had staged a sit-in at Karachi Club for their demands.
This was stated by Lal Malhi, MNA, Chela Ram of Pakistan Hindu Council, Karamat Ali, Chief Executive of Pakistan Institute of Labour Education and Research (PILER) and Zulfiqar Shah of Pakistan Dalit Solidarity Network (PDSN) at a press conference at Karachi Press Club on Wednesday.
The written agreement, signed on Saturday night by Sindh Ministers Dr. Sikandare Mandhro, Mukesh Mumar Chawla and Giyanchand Israni, Commissioner of Karachi Shoaib Ahmed Siddiqui, DIG of Police, Karachi (South) Abdul Khaliq Shaikh, SSP South Faisal Bashir Memon and Deputy Commission of South Jamal Muzafa Qazi. From the protestors’ side the agreement document was signed by Chela Ram, Suresh Kumar, Karamat Ali, Krishan Sharma and Zulfiqar Shah. Addressing at the press conference, Karamat Ali of PILER said that the government, in principle has agreed to solve all the outstanding problems of Hindus and other non-Muslims in Sindh. The Sindh Chief Minister has asked the already formed high level committee on the problems of Hindus comprising former Chief Justice of Supreme Court of Pakistan Rana Bhagwandas, the Chairperson of Sindh Human Rights Commission Justice (Retd.) Majida Razvi and advocate Jhamat Mal to prepare recommendations and submit to the government for implementation. He also announced to include Karamat Ali of PILER into the committee. This joint committee would soon meet and start its deliberations.
The Chief Minister has also asked the Sindh Minister for Law Dr. Sikandar Mandhro and Karachi’s Commissioner Shoaib Siddiqui to finalize the amount for the compensations and it was decided that the Law Minister would personally handover the cheques to the victims’ families in Umerkot.
Karamat Ali said that the attitude of the provincial government is quite positive towards solving the non-Muslims’ issues, which shows the government is serious and intends to take action. He said earlier, an investigation was done under the supervision of DIG Sanaullah Abbasi, but the report was not made public. He hoped that DIG Abdul Khaliq Shaikh would start the fresh investigations of the twin murders very soon as he has been asked to submit the report within five days.
The Supreme Court of Pakistan gave a verdict on 24th June, 2014 for protection of minorities. “We had also included the demand the government to implement the Supreme Court decision.” The government has agreed to work on it.
Lal Malhi, MNA said the main demand of Umerkot people was to remove the SSP of the district as he has not arrested the culprits.
