KARACHI: A shutter-down strike is being observed today in Karachi on a call given by the Ahl-i-Sunnat Wal Jamaat (ASWJ) against the ongoing wave of sectarian killings, several traders, transporters and political parties gave their backing to the call of strike, Dispatch News Desk (DND) reported on Friday.
The private schools will be kept closed today. All Karachi Trader Ittehad, Karachi Small Traders Association and Electronics Dealers Association also announced to keep their businesses closed.
Incidents of rioting and gunfire were reported in Guru Mandir area of the city where some protestors burnt tyres and blocked the roads.
Rioters blocked the National Highway near Quaidabad’s Murghi Khana area whereas Mauripur road was closed for traffic by protestors. Two cars were torched in Kharadar area. While one person was killed by gunfire near Capri cinema on M. A. Jinnah road.
The shutdown call was given after a surge in the recent spate of target killings over sectarian grounds saw several clerics, affiliated with various religious sects, gunned down in the city.
The call has been supported by over a dozen Sunni organisations and traders and transporters. In a rare gesture, the Shia Ulema Council also backed the strike call.
“The strike call is supported by the Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F), Wafaqul Madaris al Arabia, an organisation representing more than 10,000 seminaries and around 8,000 Iqra schools across the country, and five other organisations,” said Maulana Akbar Saeed Farooqi of the ASWJ.
“We all feel the pain of the brutality that has been going on in the city. Religious scholars and seminary students are also being targeted along the common people and no one knows the reason behind this menace. There is no doubt that the government has failed to protect lives of the common people and has thus lost the right to govern,” he added.
DND
