PPP MPA Taimur Talpur has said that the Sindh government allowed people and nationalistic parties to hold a peaceful protest against Bahria Town. “What they did was not a protest but terrorism.”
He remarked, while speaking on SAMAA TV’s 7se8 on Monday, that whatever happened during the protest was shameful and condemnable. “There is different being staging protests and engaging in terrorist activities.”
The Sindh government will make sure no one dares engage in such antics again, he added.
When asked about the land-grabbing allegations against Bahria Town, Talpur remarked that PPP Chairperson Bilawal Bhutto Zardari has taken notice and many policemen have been detained too.
He claimed that most of the protesters were people who sold their land at a lower price and now they expect to be compensated.
Speaking on the topic, JI’s Hafiz Naeemur Rehman remarked that the government must take action now and stop making speeches. “Karachi and Hyderabad are being set on fire once again.” People responsible for this should be punished, he added.
An anti-terrorism court in Karachi has handed over 120 people to the police for two-day physical remand a day after they were arrested during a protest against Bahria Town in Karachi.
Hundreds of protesters had reportedly attacked Bahria Town Karachi and set fire to several shops and vehicles in the housing society on Sunday. They were protesting what they say their forceful eviction from their ancestral lands in the vicinity.
The Bahria Town protest
The Sindh Action Committee, an alliance of nationalist parties in the province, gave the call for the protest against the alleged hostile takeover of some goths by the Bahria Town management.
The committee comprises Qadir Magsi, Jalal Mehmood Shah, Ayaz Latif Palijo, and other Sindhi nationalist leaders. The Sindh Indigenous Rights Alliance, which has led several such protests, supported the call too.
It was attended by residents of nearby villages, who say they are being forced to give up their lands.
“As soon as the protest turned violent, we withdrew all our members,” Sira’s Hafeez Baloch had told SAMAA Digital. “We were not part of what happened there. It might be a conspiracy of Bahria Town to turn a peaceful protest violent.”
The alliance has been striving to save the lands of the indigenous people for the last eight years.
Bahria Town officials often visit nearby goths and ask the residents to vacate them, according to Baloch. They have offered to financially compensate the residents but the villagers have refused to give up their ancestral lands.
The Bahria Town management is trying to take over the lands in Noor Mohammad Gabol Goth, Usman Allahrakhiyo Goth, Hadi Bakhsh Gabol Goth, and Abdullah Gabol Goth, according to Baloch.
Apart from these goths, it wishes to take over private lands owned by Kamal Jokhiyo, Faiz Gabol, and Ameeruddin Gabol too.
Sindh Action Committee’s Qadir Magsi said those who engaged in violence had nothing to do with the protesters.
“They were Bahria Town’s own people who deliberately drove the protest towards violence,” he told SAMAA Digital. “We were staging a peaceful sit-in and the Sindh Action Committee had nothing to do with the violence in Bahria Town.”
Magsi said the police arrested around a dozen protesters. He demanded their immediate release.
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