Protest, prayers for Taseer’s killer

Karachi
The Pakistan Sunni Tehreek, Jamaat-e-Ahle Sunnat Pakistan and several scholars staged a protest outside the Karachi Press Club on Friday against the decision of the Supreme Court to uphold the death sentence of Mumtaz Qadri on terrorism charges.
A volunteer of the organising committee claimed that 5,000 people attended the protest to demand that Qadri be allowed to pay blood money for murdering Punjab governor Salmaan Taseer.
“We can pay double the compensation amount,” the protesters said, referring to Diyat. “If Raymond Davis could be released through the payment of blood money, then why not Mumtaz Qadri?”
Speakers on the occasion alleged that Taseer had spoken about the blasphemy law as a ‘black law’ again and again, which had hurt the public sentiments. They said that the government of the time should have stepped in to stop Taseer from making such statements.
“He appeared again and again on television with his agenda to dissolve the blasphemy law,” they said. “But no government official intervened to stop him from doing that.”
The speakers including Syed Muazaffar Husain Shah, Abbas Ali Qadri, Shahid Ghouri, Mufi Asif Abdullah, Ghulam Ghous Baghdadi, Mufri Shahid, Husaain Lakhani and Bilal Saleem Qadri also claimed that Mumtaz Qadri had been provoked to act since the government, through its lack of control, had let Taseer disrespect the religion on television without any check.
They believed that the government did not consider the issue serious enough, and called for more protests in favour of Mumtaz Qadri.
Muzaffar Hussain Shah had earlier urged prayers leaders in mosques to deliver speeches and recite special prayers for the convict.
In line with his instructions, special dua was offered in a large number of mosques after the Jumma prayers.