About three months after regaining the Punjab law minister’s portfolio, Rana Sanaullah is embroiled in another controversy. And this time around, a senior leader from his own party has accused him of ‘killing 20 people’.The allegation came from Chaudhry Sher Ali, the father of Minister of State for Water and Power Abid Sher Ali, who is said to be heading the PML-N group in Faisalabad which is against Rana Sanaullah and a few others. Chaudhry Sher Ali said the other day Rana Sanaullah was involved in the murder of 20 people. “I have on me SMS of former district police officer Sohail Tajik confirming the involvement of Rana Sanaullah in the killing of 20 people. I had brought the matter to the notice of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif who asked Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif to take action against Sanaullah. But no action has been taken against him so far,” Mr Ali said. The former PML-N MNA demanded strict action against the ‘killer of 20 people’ and also sought an ‘operation’ in Faisalabad so that the ‘killers’ could be apprehended. Reacting to the allegation, Rana Sanaullah, who is considered a close aide to the chief minister, said there was a ‘motive’ behind these allegations. “Sher Ali wants his son to be appointed as mayor of Faisalabad. If I support him, he will start praising me,” he said, adding he would not take up the matter legally. “I would rather take up it with the party leadership,” he said. One wonders when the politics of the party will move beyond intimidation and bribery.The fact is that these are games of power, and public humiliation is an oft-used tactic by these politicians. They will probably solve it internally among themselves and the media will move on to other pressing problems. The police is a pawn in the hands of those in power – something that has been made abundantly clear in the case of the Kasur child abuse cases. It is unlikely that there will be any action or inquiry into Sanaullah’s dealings. If the accusations are true the police is probably complicit and so are many others from the PML-N. Rana Sahib may or may not have been directly involved in killing of 20 people, as being alleged, but there is no doubt at all about one thing: he always seems to be on the wrong side of the law. His statement that the Kasur child abuse incidents were “baseless” was appalling. Why he is not being (at least) reprimanded by his party seniors? Is he so useful that despite all his misdeeds and mistakes, he cannot be made to practice restraint, in word and in deed? That he is the Punjab Law Minister in the first place is a liberty taken. That he should be so cavalier when giving statements in his position, is even more impetuous.
pk.shafaqna.com
