Pakistan: Thousands including minority Hindus protest against "dacoit rule" in Kandhkot

Islamabad [Pakistan], September 3 : Thousands of citizens took out a peace procession and staged a sit-in at Ghantaghar Chowk in Kandhkot town on the second consecutive day in protest against police’s failure to recover the hostages, including several members of the minority Hindu community in Pakistan’s Sukkur, Dawn reported on Saturday.

The protestors included activists of nationalist parties, social and rights organisations and traders, who also raised voices against restoring law and order in the crime-infested Kandhkot, Kashmore district.

The traders and shopkeepers kept their businesses and shops shuttered on a call for protest given by ‘Hindu Panchayat’ against the abduction of Mukhi Jagdish Kumar, Jaideep Kumar, Hindu Sagar Kumar, Guddo, Muneer Naich and several other hostages kidnapped in different areas of the district, Dawn reported.

The leaders of the protest included Mehr Chand, Harish Kumar, advocate Abdul Ghani Bijarani, Hafiz Nasrullah Chana and others, who demanded a massive army operation against the “dacoits rule” in the district.

“The local Sardars were patronisers, harbourers and facilitators of criminals, who had made their life miserable”, they said.

They said that several businessmen, including their children, had been kidnapped in many instances, and no one was safe in the district.

“Now, public places such as roads, markets, localities and even villages were not safe and people and their properties were at the mercy of dacoits and outlaws,” Dawn quoted the protestors as saying.

The protestors further said that even policemen were not safe. Dacoits often kidnapped law enforcers to force police to release their arrested associates and police bowed to the criminals within no time in order to save their colleagues, they added.

They alleged that the dacoits uploaded the video of Jagdish Kumar on social media in which he could be seen being beaten up and his tormentors being heard demanding millions of rupees as ransom.

The protestors have said that these videos were a stain on the government’s human rights record and a challenge to the writ of the state.

“We demand a massive army operation against the criminals and their patronizers, who have created a criminal state within a state,” Dawn quoted them as saying.

In another incident, several members of the minority organisation ‘Pakistan Darawar Ittehad’ and its supporters took out a procession from the railway station to the State Life building on Saturday in protest against the police's failure to recover a teenage girl — from the Hindu community and a student of class seven — who was kidnapped about a month ago, Dawn reported.

The Ittehad leader's, Faqir Shevaji Kachhi, Alam Kolhi, Tagji Kolhi and others accused a number of suspects of being involved in a 16-year-old girl’s abduction.

They demanded the Sindh IGP and SSP of Mirpurkhas order the registration of cases of the suspects and ensure the girl’s immediate release from their illegal confinement.

Meanwhile, Pakistan has a terrible record in human rights. The year 2022 was a dreadful year for Balochistan as the forcibly disappeared record touched 629, extra-judicially killed 195 and tortured 187 people, according to the annual report released by Paank, the human rights organization of the Baloch National Movement.

In April, earlier this year, Pakistan vernacular media Urdu Point reported that a protest rally in Quetta was organised by 'Voice for Baloch Missing Persons' against fake encounters and forced disappearances. The protesters called for the recovery of missing people.

The report highlights the human rights situation throughout the year with infographics. According to this, in January 2022, there were 92 forced disappearances, 15 murders and one person was tortured by the Pakistan army. 

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