Effandi, Hyderabad correspondent for the Karachi-based Urdu-language daily Parcham, was seized in Hyderabad by government paramilitary rangers and taken to a local police station where he was held in custody for two days. Effandi told colleagues that he was blindfolded, kicked and beaten during his detention there. On Sept. 16, he was charged with illegally possessing a Kalashnikov automatic rifle, which rangers claimed to have found during a Sept. 15 raid on his office. Effandi’s trial is scheduled for Feb. 22, 1996, in Hyderabad. His newspaper is widely seen as an organ of the Mohajir Qaumi Movement (MQM), an armed opposition party of Muslim immigrants from India and their descendants.