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| Police give in to Jamia Hafsa students |
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Thursday, March 29, 2007
Shakeel Anjum & Mobarik A Virk
ISLAMABAD: Female students of Jamia Hafsa seminary, backed by male students of other Madrassas, prevailed on the Islamabad police after a daylong showdown here on Wednesday.
The trouble started when the seminary students and teachers, supported by their patrons in Lal Masjid, decided to take the “community correction role” in their hands and kidnapped an old woman, her young daughter and daughter-in-law on Tuesday night blaming them for “immoral activities” in the area.
The Islamabad police and the district administration started negotiations with the Lal Masjid management to get the three women released. However, the students as well as their patrons refused to cooperate with the authorities.
In a “tit-for-tat” move the police picked up two female teachers and as many drivers of the Jamia Hafsa seminary who were busy threatening the shopkeepers selling video and audio CDs in a local market at 9.30am on Wednesday. The teachers were identified as Tasleem Bibi and Saeeda Bibi while the drivers were identified as Muhammad Ayub and Zabta Khan.
This complicated the situation as the male and female students retaliated by kidnapping two police officials and confiscating two official police vehicles — one belonging to the Punjab police and the other to the Islamabad police at 12.30 pm on Wednesday.
The male students belonging to different Madrassas blocked roads to protest the police action. The Islamabad police high-ups, it was reliably learnt, ordered the Station House Officer (SHO) of the Aabpara police station to take action and get the policemen — Constable Kaamal Abbas (Islamabad police) and Hamad Raza (Punjab police) — released from the custody of the students who had taken the men and vehicles inside Jamia Hafsa.
However, the SHO showed reluctance because he did not have enough force to deal with any untoward situation. Subsequently the SHO was suspended, it was learnt. It was also learnt that the government came under immense pressure from unknown quarters that the federal interior secretary, in a top-level meeting, ordered release of the teachers and drivers “unconditionally” expecting the Jamia Hafsa administration would reciprocate the “peace gesture”.
The Islamabad police released the two female teachers and the drivers who had been taken into custody for creating disturbances in a busy city market. The detainees were released from the Aabpara police station around 7.30pm.
The seminary students released the two police constables, along with their vehicles at 9.30pm, who were kidnapped earlier in the day. However, the three women, who were kidnapped by the students of different Madrassas of Islamabad on Tuesday night from a thickly populated locality of sector G-6/1, were still not released.
It was also learnt that the Lal Masjid management had also included the names of Khalid Khawaja, Asmatullah, Shamsuddin, Ismail, Najeeb, Ghulam Nabi and Mohammad Umar, the men taken into custody by the government on various charges in the past, in the list of the persons that they have submitted to the government for release as a condition to the release the policemen.
The female students of Jamia Hafsa came into limelight after they forcibly took over the only Children’s Library in the federal capital. They have still not vacated the building. There was hardly any government official available to give the exact picture of the situation and answer questions of mediapersons.
It could not be known as to why the Islamabad police has yet not registered the case of “kidnapping” against those who forcibly picked up the three women from their home. It could not be ascertained if any case was being registered for kidnapping the two police officials and confiscating police vehicles.
It could not be known if any case was registered against the two female teachers who tried to create a law and order situation in a local market. In a late night move an official in the Islamabad administration claimed that a case has been registered against Maulana Abdul Aziz, Ghazi Abdur Rashid and some others and that the FIR has been sealed.
APP adds: The Islamabad Capital Territory (ICT) administration in a statement on Wednesday explained the official position regarding the Jamia Hafsa issue. In a statement it said the girl students of Jamia Hafsa and students of Lal Masjid have been threatening the owners of video shops for the last three days in markets of the federal capital.
The statement said that House No 303, Cat-111 at Street No 87,G-6/1-4, has been allotted to Kamran after the death of his father Matloob Hussain Naqvi. Kamran is a government servant and is performing his duties as Upper Division Clerk at Government Girls High School Bari Imam.
On Monday, a group of girl students from Jamia Hafsa went to the house of Kamran and questioned about the character of his mother and also intimidated her. On Tuesday around 7.45pm, the girl students along with some young persons again visited the same house in two vehicles and forcibly picked up Shamim widow of Matloob Hussain, her daughter-in-law Nadia Batool, w/o Kamran, Sadaf Fatima and six-month old daughter of Kamran.
They kept them hostage at Lal Mosque and they were still in their custody on Wednesday. The Islamabad administration tried hard to settle the issue through dialogue and in this connection, Assistant Commissioner Rana Akbar Hayat and City Magistrate Khan Farasat held talks with Ghazi Abdur Rasheed.
In the meantime, the students of Lal Masjid and Jamia Hafsa took two vehicles of the police into their custody and drove these inside the Masjid premises. One vehicle belongs to the Punjab police with its driver Hamad Raza while the second is owned by Security Division Islamabad with driver Qamar Abbas.
The administration of Lal Masjid which consists of Maulana Abdul Aziz and Maulana Abdur Rasheed have also launched an illegal FM Radio service with its transmissions aired on FM Channel 92-96, the statement said. The Islamabad police have arrested two students of Lal Masjid and another two of Jamia Hafsa, while the Islamabad administration is trying to resolve the matter through negotiations.
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ISSN 1563-9479 
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