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TOBA TEK SINGH, March 10: Pirmahal police registered a case on Monday against more than 60 people, including a lumberdar, his son and gunmen, who fired at officials outside the police station after the lumberdar’s arrest Saturday night. Police have arrested the gunman.
Reports said a police team, headed by Rajana police SHO Khizar Hayat Wahla, raided chak 719-GB in Pirmahal police station precinct to arrest Muhammad Ashraf, a robbery complainant. When the police pinioned him, local lumberdar Chaudhry Nabi Ahmad Bajwa intervened and asked the police not to arrest Ashraf, as he claimed that he (Ashraf) was not an accused but a complainant. Following the SHO’s resistance, both of them exchanged harsh words.
The SHO also picked up the lumberdar and took him to the police station. His son Omar Nawaz Bajwa, his gunman Abdul Hameed and scores of locals followed them in jeeps and a tractor-trolley. Near an imambargah in the town, Omar and his gunman opened fire on the police, which reached their destination unhurt.
The chasers surrounded the police station while the lumberdar’s son manhandled the SHO in rage. Later, Pirmahal union council Nazim Chaudhry Shafqat Rasool, who is the lumberdar’s son-in-law, reached there. Meanwhile, the mob kept pelting stones on the police, which had to disperse the people through firing.
Officials of the nearby police stations, District Nazim Chaudhry Muhammad Ashfaq, DCO Saleem Akhtar Kiani, DPO Chaudhry Muhammad Ashraf and PPP’s Khalid Ahmad Kharal also reached the police station and tried to mediate between the lumberdar’s family and the police officials.
Police registered a case against the three men under the arms act. They let the lumberdar’s family go, but detained the gunman and seized his two kalashnikoves.
The union council Nazim left the police station, demanding action against the Rajana and Pirmahal police stations’ SHOs.
INQUIRY ORDERED: District and Sessions Judge Muhammad Akram Zaki on Monday ordered a judicial inquiry into the alleged police torture of a Faisalabad government college university lecturer, his father and a brother.
Nawan Lahore police had arrested Chaudhry Shabbir Ahmad, his father and a brother in a timber theft case, and allegedly tortured them two months ago.
Earlier, a Gojra civil judge had ordered registration of case against former Nawan Lahore SHO Nasir Nawaz and other policemen, who tortured the accused. District Public Safety Commission chairman Rai Ziaullah Khan had formed an inquiry committee.
TORTURE CONDEMNED: Pakistan Muslim League (Nawaz) central leader on Monday condemned torture of party’s parliamentary leader Rana Sanaullah Khan.
In a press statement, he demanded President Gen Pervez Musharraf and Chief Minister Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi to take action against the agency, which had kidnapped the PML-N leader and manhandled him.
