People of Pakistan were stunned when they watched the video showing Rangers personnel killing a young man in cold blood in a public place during the night of 8 June 2011. Passers-by gathered around the scene and made videos of the incident. The videos were then supplied to different television channels who broadcasted them immediately. Before the video was broadcasted, making the reality of the incident public, a spokesperson of the Sindh Rangers, a paramilitary force, issued a press statement claiming that the 25 year old Sarfaraz Shah was killed during an encounter with Rangers deployed outside a park in Karachi. The press release further claimed that Sarfaraz Shah was caught red handed while snatching cash and valuables from park visitors and that when Rangers officials entered the park, the young man fired at them. The Rangers further claim that they then returned fire, killing the so-called ‘bandit’.
But the claim of the Rangers was proven to be totally forged when, after some time, the television channels showed the unarmed young man being shot dead at a very close range by one of the five Rangers personnel present at the scene. Sarfaraz was seen pleading for his life and being surrounded by a group of Rangers personnel who fired at him in full public view. Please see the following link of the video footage broadcasted by different TV channels: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0mCbWIEk8qI.
After the incident, relatives and supporters took the body of the young man in front of the Sindh Chief Minister House in protest. They demanded the immediate registration of a First Information Report (FIR) against the Rangers personnel and the prompt arrest of those involved in the murder. Following the exposure of the reality of the brutal action, the government arrested five Ranger officials late at night.
Earlier this year, the government had decided to again grant police powers to the Rangers. The Rangers are now entitled to conduct raids, detain and interrogate suspects on their own. Enjoying the police powers emboldens the Rangers to kill common people and cover the killings as fake encounters. In May 2011, Rangers killed two young men form Lyari, in the old told of the Karachi city, claiming they had attacked the law enforcement agencies. In the current year, at least five persons have already been killed when the Rangers shot at them at point blank.
The extra judicial killing of Sarfaraz Shah clearly exposes the collapse of the rule of law in the country, where law enforcement authorities are using extra-judicial powers to kill anyone while claiming that they are working to maintain law and order and peace and to combat terrorism. Even if the Rangers’ version of events was accurate, that is to say if the deceased young man was a bandit, no law allows the Rangers to kill suspects, especially when they are unarmed and do not cause a direct threat to their lives. The victim should have been arrested and produced before a court for trial on charges of robbery and snatching. Usually in cases of fake encounters, government and its authorities do not launch any inquiry to determine the circumstances of the killings and blindly support the versions of events of the law enforcement agencies. Nevertheless, now thanks to the diffusion of electronic devices, ordinary people are making footages of such events with their cell phone cameras and provide them to the media. This now exposes the reality of the crimes which are committed in the name of maintaining peace and law and order.
This case is revealing of the law enforcement agencies’ belief that they are above the law and out of the reach of the courts. By conducting summary executions, they challenge the principles of fair trial, undermine the legal process through the courts and pose themselves as judge and executioner of the victim. This incident shows that every day in Pakistan, the right to life of the people is made a mockery of by the people who are at the helm of State affairs.
The Pakistan Rangers form a key part of the paramilitary force command. The Rangers are selected from the Pakistan Army and are placed under the direct control of the Ministry of the Interior. The Rangers are entrusted with the task to provide and maintain security in hot conflict and war zone areas. Its heads are always from the highest ranks of Pakistan Army. Since the deployment of the Rangers in Karachi and whole Sindh province in the early 1990s, challenges to law and order have been multiplied. The Rangers are so arrogant that people are not even allowed to walk on the footpaths in front of their offices. Considering themselves as having the authority of the law, they have grabbed vast patches of land to establish their head offices in different cities of the province without following any legal process and are vulgarly using force against the people to affirm their power.
It is still not clear under which criminal sections of the Criminal Procedure Code the officials involved in the extra judicial killing of the young man were arrested but some media reports are suggesting that they were arrested under minor charges rather under the murder charges.
The government should immediately constitute a judicial commission to probe into the incident and bring the perpetrators to open courts trial for the murder of an unarmed person in a public place. The government must also take the measure of the incident: it should immediately withdraw the Rangers from the public places and strictly abide by the Rangers Ordinance 1959 according to which Rangers are supposed to provide and maintain security exclusively in hot conflict and war zone areas.
