Raiwind 'terrorist' denied burial at hometown

SAHIWAL: Residents of Pakpattan's 57/SP denied burial of Zulfiqar Nazir, an alleged terrorist who was killed by law-enforcement agencies (LEAs) during a raid at a hideout in Raiwind, Lahore. Zulfiqar's mother Naziran Bibi and other members of the family received his body this past Friday and faced resistance in burial wherever they went. Eventually, they laid him to rest at an undisclosed place. The residents of 57/SP insisted that a terrorist could not be buried in the village graveyard and his body should be sent to the place where he was killed. Later, his mother took the body to her ancestral village 21/4-L in Okara, where they again faced resistance. LEAs raided a house at Ariyan village along Raiwind Road on the night between July 16 and 17 and conducted an operation when one of the occupants shot dead a security official. The LEAs shot dead Zulfiqar Nazir, one of the suspects, during a 10-hour long operation. The agencies picked up his brother Iftikhar Nazir and Tariq, Iftikhar's brother-in-law, and took them to an undisclosed location for identification of Zulfiqar's body. Iftikhar identified the body and LEAs allowed them to take it for burial after investigation for a few days. Nazirain Bibi claimed that no prayer leader agreed to lead his funeral prayers. A village lumberdar and some elders asked the family to bury Zulfiqar either in ancestral village or in Lahore, where he had been living with his family for the last two years. Malik Hans SHO Mahar Nowsher Kathyia confirmed to Dawn that the family faced resistance in burial of Zulfiqar as some people took the plea that it would become a cause for contention in future.It is learnt that Zulfiqar was also involved in a bomb blast at the shrine of Baba Farid Ganjshakar a few years ago. Published in Dawn, July 27th, 2014