Karachi : In yet ‘another post midnight’ shootout with the law enforcement agencies in the heart of Karachi’s de facto gangland Lyari, three suspected gangsters said to have the blood of dozens on their hands dropped dead by the wayside.
“It was an intelligence based raid. The gangsters were on our radar for a long time. We cornered them in Kalakot neighbourhood of Lyari and the armed encounter resulted in the neutralization of the trio,” an official told media sources .
The slain mobsters, wanted for multiple counts of violent crimes, were lieutenants of notorious fugitive ganglord Uzair Jan Baloch, the official said giving out further details. “They were heavily armed when cops engaged them. Their weapons are now in our custody,” added he.
In the city’s tough neck of the woods, Lyari, populated largely by ethnic Baluch, joining a gang is a way of life — and a means of survival.
Karachi, a sprawling port city of 18 million people, has been wracked by criminal, ethnic and political violence since the 1990s. In recent years it has also become a home to Islamist militants.
An operation by police and paramilitary forces launched in 2013 has brought murders down from a rate of seven or eight a day to two or three, along with a 23 percent fall in street crime.
The campaign took a fresh turn two weeks ago when paramilitary Rangers raided the MQM headquarters, seizing weapons and arresting activists, including one accused of murdering a journalist.
But critics say the crackdown has involved an unacceptable disregard for the judicial process, with security personnel effectively “executing” suspects in staged clashes known locally as “encounter killings”.
The police deny that such killings take place. Ghulam Haider Jamali, chief of the province’s police force, instead extols what he calls effective police action.
“Karachi was having extraordinary challenges. Karachi has terrorist infested areas. They come from across the country, they were killing police personnel, they were targeting Shias and innocent citizens of the city, the Ulema (religious leaders), members of the civil society,” he said.
“The situation demanded we should go for strong action against the criminals and militants. We have been able to control the situation and bring the crime down.”
According to police figures, since July 2014 at least 895 criminals and militants were killed in gun fights.
On the streets, residents say they feel safer and are able to go to previously dangerous areas like the Taliban-infested Sohrab Goth district, where the Rangers have conducted several raids.
“You couldn’t go out at night,” said Haji Abdullah Shah Bokhari, a local preacher. “If you did, you would not expect to go home alive. Now we feel much safer”.
