Machh victim’s sister feels Karbala tragedy revisiting them

QUETTA: "All the male members of my family have been killed and there is no male member left to carry my brother’s body to the graveyard, offer prayers and to lower him in the grave," said a sniffling Masooma in an emotionally-choked voice.

Masooma Yaqoob Ali, a Haraza woman of Balochistan, whose brother Muhammad Sadiq was brutally killed by an extremist organisation Dolat-e-Islamia in district Mach of Balochistan on Sunday along with 10 other coal miners, including four other close relatives, said her brother was the only earning member for the entire family. " In fact, he was the only male," said Ali while holding her hand to her chest.

Trying to hold back tears, Masooma said her brother Muhammad Sadiq supported the family of 10, including his wife, two daughters, six sisters and an ailing father. The disaster-struck Ali said it seems as if the Karbala tragedy had befallen upon their family as all their male relatives have been wiped away and there is no one left in the family to lower the victims in the graves. Struggling to regain composure, she said the six sisters have now decided to proceed and perform the funeral of their brother and other relatives on their own. It is pertinent to mention that all the victims of the tragedy belonged to the Hazara community of Balochistan.

Meanwhile, the relatives of the deceased miners staged a protest demonstration and sit-in along with the bodies in Quetta pleading neither to leave nor bury the deceased until their demands would be accepted. As many as five people of a family were killed in the attack.