Demonstration against cleric

Staff Report

KARACHI: Protestors on Sunday demonstrated outside the Karachi Press Club against a so-called religious teacher who threw acid on a student who refused his (religious teacher) sexual advances.

One Qari Amin told Abid Hazarvi, a student of class 9, that he would teach him the Quran for free at a mosque in Orangi Town Sector 4-F. He then tried to persuade Abid to have sex with him. When Abid refused, Qari Amin and his accomplices threw acid on the teenager, burning him from his face to his abdomen.

Abid’s father, Haroon, told journalists that he was a poor taxi driver and sold his taxi and house for his son’s medical treatment. He said he had to repay Rs 400,000, which he had borrowed for treatment from friends and relatives. Haroon said he had sent telegrams to President Gen Pervez Musharraf, Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali, the Sindh governor and chief minister and Supreme and Sindh High Court chief justices asking them for financial aid for his son’s medical treatment, but none responded.

Lines Area residents demonstrate: The Awami Ittehad Welfare Committee and Lines Area Bachao Committee demonstrated outside the Karachi Press Club and demanded the government lease the Lines Area. They asked the government to punish those who misappropriated millions of rupees in the name of projects aimed at providing alternate land to the Lines Area residents.

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