Hundreds of MQM workers formed a chain against Rangers when they raided party’s headoffice, but no one among the protesters resorted to violent approach in registering their protest. All of them were shouting slogans against the law enforcers and chanting in favour of their party chief Altaf Hussain.
Waqas Shah was also among the frontline protesters when Rangers were pushing back the demonstrators to complete their search operation sans any impediment.
In a TV footage captured at the moment, party supporters were seen confronting the Rangers personnel, however Waqas Shah was behind his party men and did not engage neither in scuffle nor bickering with law enforcers.
Amid the pushing and shoving between protesters and paramilitary men, gunshots were heard and the very next moment Shah was seen lying on the ground having fatal bullet wounds. DG Rangers Sindh categorically disputed the MQM’s claim that gunshots fired by Rangers man at party activist and said paramilitary forces do not use pistols.
The Rangers said there was no resistance during the raid, but television footage showed Rangers soldiers firing gunshots while leaving the offices.
A “huge quantity of weapons and ammo” were seized in the raid, said Colonel Tahir Mahmood, who was leading the team, told reporters outside MQM headquarters.
“The finding of weapons carries a question mark and we will investigate it,” Mahmood said.
MQM condemned the raid and insisted that the weapons were all legally held.
“It was all licensed weapons issued to the MPs of the party,” senior MQM leader Haider Abbas Rizvi told a wire service correspondent.
He said it was a disgrace that a leading political party was “being ridiculed in such a ruthless way”.
