KARACHI: Life in the city came to a virtual standstill on Saturday, with most public transport vehicles remaining off the roads and businesses remaining shut in the wake of a call for a ‘day of mourning’ after the killing of noted religious scholar Allama Sarfaraz Naeemi in Lahore on Friday.

Many stayed indoors after a few incidents of arson and firing were reported early in the day.

Major business centres and markets remained closed as traders observed the day of mourning, unanimously called by several religious parties and a political party following the brutal killing of Allama Naeemi in a suicide attack at his seminary in Lahore after Friday prayers.

A large number of petrol pumps were also closed and the few that remained open were seen catering to long queues of vehicles.

Business leaders and representatives of transport operators asserted that they voluntarily kept their businesses closed to condemn the act of terrorism in Lahore which led to the death of the religious scholar, who supported the military action against the Taliban and had given a decree stating that suicide attacks are un-Islamic.

They all regretted, however, that an ‘unseen force’ in Karachi ‘always emerged in reaction to such incidents in any part of the country to sabotage the city’s law and order situation’ and to harass the common man.

As the day began, a bus parked near the main Korangi stop was set on fire by miscreants. The Central Fire Station recorded that a total of four vehicles met the same fate in 24 hours in Gulberg, Jehangir Road and Korangi areas.

Nearly half a dozen people were also injured in firing incidents, mainly in New Karachi, Baldia Town, Shah Faisal Colony and Lines Area. By the wee hours of Saturday, the Abbassi Shaheed Hospital had received a total of three injured with bullet wounds, while the Civil Hospital and the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre (JPMC) received four victims, two each, with wounds of the same nature.

‘Every Pakistani and Muslim is deeply grieved due to the tragic incident and that is why we kept our shutters down to mourn such a loss,’ said Ateeq Meer, chairman of the Alliance of Market Associations, a common platform for nearly 300 market and traders’ associations in the city.

He said the city’s major markets remained closed in line with the call from political and religious parties, but a few retail markets in mainstream residential localities did carry out normal business.

Similarly, the majority of public transport operators preferred not to bring their vehicles on the roads after the call for the day of mourning, coupled with the incidents of arson, convinced them to refrain from normal business.

Though the majority of stakeholders voluntarily avoided business on the day of mourning, their leaders said that a few incidents of violence and unavailability of labour also compelled those transporters who normally operated on such days to cease activities.

‘We have reports of two buses and a taxi being set on fire in different areas by late Friday night,’ said Azam Khan, a senior member of the Karachi Transport Ittehad (KTI), the largest single alliance of the city’s transporters.

He criticised the government’s efforts to keep law and order in control at a time when the majority of businessmen and transporters, regardless of their political or religious associations, stood together to condemn terrorism.

Though the city remained lifeless during the day, public transport began operating by the second half of the day, which considerably defused the tension and fear which had enveloped the city.

However, some areas, including Shah Faisal Colony, Landhi, Korangi, Lines Area, New Karachi and Orangi Town failed to return to normality till the evening.