Strike in Golarchi following FIR against Zulfiqar Mirza

BADIN: A strike was observed in Golarchi town on Monday following the registration of a case against former Sindh home minister Dr Zulfiqar Mirza at a police station in his hometown Badin.

Badin was on edge the previous day when Mirza, along with hundreds of supporters and gunmen, broke into the Model Police Station and asked DSP Badin Abdul Qadir Samoon to register a case against PPP MNA Sardar Kamal Khan Chang and police officers for acting against his men.

Police had arrested Mirza's aide Nadeem Mughal on Sunday but he was freed by his supporters.

Shortly after the incident, Mirza and his gunmen forced shopkeepers to shut down their businesses in Badin city. Video footage showed the enraged former home minister barge into the police station, break the glass table in the deputy superintendent's office, and hurling abuses at him.

On the complaint of a local trader, a case was later registered against Mirza, 21 of his aides and several unidentified men under Anti-Terrorism Act on charges of attacking a police station and forcibly shutting down markets in the district.

The situation was still tense in different parts of Badin as shops and trade centres remained closed in Golarchi today. Unidentified men burned tires at different points of the Badin-Karachi highway.

The local administration has deployed a large contingent of police personnel on the road leading up to Mirza farm.