Jamaat-e-Islami member Rafiq Tanoli, who was seriously injured in Wednesday’s bomb attack on a rally held in Karachi in connection with Day of Exploitation of Kashmir, succumbed to his injuries at a hospital on Thursday.
Tanoli, who was the JI head for the Quaidabad neighbourhood, was injured during the attack on the party’s rally in Gulshan-e-Iqbal. He had been admitted to the Liaquat National Hospital. Police said the victim had suffered grenade pellets to his abdomen, adding that around a dozen injured people are still admitted in different hospitals, while others have been released after being treated.
Tanoli’s funeral prayers were offered outside Idara Noor-e-Haq, the JI headquarters on New MA Jinnah Road, and they were attended by his family, other relatives and a large number of leaders and workers of the party. JI Karachi chief Hafiz Naeemur Rehman led the prayers.
Tanoli’s body was later sent to his home town for burial. The participants of the funeral also shouted slogans against the attackers and demanded immediate arrest of the culprits. Rehman told the media after the funeral that one of their members had embraced martyrdom while several others were injured. He blamed India for the attack and said our neighbour could have done nothing without local support.
“The motorcyclist threw a hand grenade in broad daylight, so it is the responsibility of the government and law enforcement agencies to arrest the culprits, their masterminds and their supporters, and these terrorists should be brought before the public,” he said. “We are here and not deterred by such cowardly acts of terrorism. We have faced such cowardly incidents in the past and are ready to face them in the future. We will organise more big rallies for the freedom and the rights of Kashmir and Kashmiris.”
Tanoli, 44, was a resident of Zafar Town and owned a bookshop in Quaidabad. He had earlier been affiliated with Shabab-e-Milli and Pasban, the JI’s associated youth organisations. His body has been sent to his home town in the Ughi area of the Mansehra district in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province for burial. He is survived by his wife, three sons and a daughter.
At least 28 people had been injured in the attack on the JI rally. They were taken to five different hospitals in the city. The rally was assembled near the Baitul Mukarram mosque when an unidentified man hurled a grenade from the opposite side of the road.
Rehman had been addressing the rally at the time of the attack. The outlawed Sindhu Desh Revolutionary Army later claimed responsibility for the attack through its social media account.
All across Pakistan, rallies were organised in connection with Day of Exploitation of Kashmir to mark the passage of one year since the annexation of Indian-Occupied Kashmir. Last year on August 5, India had revoked Kashmir’s special autonomous status by repealing articles 35A and 370 of its constitution.
CTD registers case
A day after the deadly hand grenade attack on the JI rally, Sindh’s Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) registered a case of the incident under Article 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act against unidentified persons.
FIR No. 115/20 was registered under Section 3/4 of the Explosives Act and Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act, read with sections 302 and 324/34 of the Pakistan Penal Code, on the complaint of senior JI member Raja Arif Sultan Minhas.
The complainant said in the FIR that the rally was on its way to Hassan Square when unidentified persons threw a hand grenade on the rally, intending to kill, injure and create harassment and panic among the participants.
He added that as a result of the attack, a senior member of the party lost his life while 30 to 32 others were injured. Police said that further investigation is under way.