Kidnapped surgeon killed in rescue operation

HYDERABAD: The eminent neurosurgeon Dr Aftab Ahmed Qureshi who was kidnapped from Karachi on May 12 was killed in a police encounter carried out for his recovery from his captors here on Wednesday.

The encounter involving the Karachi police, also left 2 other persons dead including Assistant Sub Inspector Kashif Khan and the suspected kidnapper Muhammad Akhtar.

The deceased ASI hailed from Mansehra while a driving license found from the suspected kidnapper contained the address of a Sindh-Balochistan border town of Osta Muhammad near Jacobabad.

The incident took place in Abdullah Valley area, Qasimabad, where the abductors had kept the doctor for over 2 weeks, according to the police.

The police also arrested a woman and his son who were staying at the ground floor of the bungalow where the kidnappers had kept the doctor.

They were identified as Kamla Kumar and Ashok Kumar and the police is investigating about their involvement in the case.

The police, according to the department's spokesman Mazhar Shani, was still looking for the other accomplices.

Meanwhile, the Deputy Inspector General, Hyderabad police, Sanaullah Abbassi said the Hyderabad police was neither informed about the operation nor was its help sought.

"We accept our failure that we could not find him though he was kept in the city," he said while talking to the media.

Dr Qureshi was one of the few renowned surgeons in the city and his abduction followed a spate of protests and work boycott by the doctors belonging to the Pakistan Medical Association as well as the bodies of
young doctors, nurses and paramedics.

The professors of Liaquat University of Medical and Health Sciences (LUMHS) also joined them in the protest.

According to the doctors at Civil Hospital who conducted the postmortem, the slain doctor had received one bullet in the head.

He will be buried in Kandiaro, Shaheed Benazirabad district. (APP)