Bureau Report
KARACHI: Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) Vice President Maryam Nawaz on Monday absolved the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) government in Sindh of the “charge” of the arrest of her husband and party leader Capt (r) Safdar Awan, saying she “never thought for a moment” that the provincial authorities were behind the move. Awan was arrested early Monday morning for slogan-mongering inside the mausoleum of Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah a day earlier. Maryam held a press conference in the evening to narrate the arrest as it took place. She was accompanied by Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazl (JUI-F) leader Maulana Fazlur Rehman.
She started by saying: “We reached home late after the jalsa. We were sleeping when early in the morning I thought I heard someone’s door being knocked on loudly. I woke up my husband and said the loud knocks were on our door.”
“Safdar opened the door and police were standing outside who said we are here to arrest you. Safdar told them he’ll change and take his medicine since he is diabetic, but they broke down the door and came inside.”
“Safdar asked them to not enter since I [his wife] was inside but they did and arrested him,” she said. The government is trying to give the impression that the Sindh government is behind this,” said Maryam, “but Bilawal had called me and he was very angry”.
“I never thought even for a moment that PPP was behind this; they [PTI] thought they can drive a wedge between PDM we know things like this would happen, we are ready as well.”
She defended the slogans raised during her visit to Quaid-i-Azam Mohammad Ali Jinnah’s mausoleum on Sunday, saying: “What is wrong with repeating Quaid-i-Azam’s stance at his mausoleum? What is wrong with Madar-i-Millat (mother of the nation) slogans? No one chanted slogans for Nawaz Sharif or me.”
