02 February 2004	Monday	10 Zilhaj 1424

TOBA TEK SINGH, Feb 1: The younger brother of a lawyer who was recently murdered over a land dispute, shot at and injured his brother and nephew in Chak 390 JB Bajwara on Sunday.

Advocate Tanvir Alam had been killed by three people and a case was registered on the complaint of his younger brother Naveed. He was pursuing the case but a couple of days ago he reconciled with the other party reportedly after receiving Rs250,000 without the consent of his family.

Advocate Tanvir's brother, Khurshid, who lives in the United Kingdom, reached Pakistan recently. Khurshid and other family members were discussing the matter when he whipped a pistol and opened fire on Naveed and his son Yasir. They were rushed to the DHQ hospital in critical condition.

bird flu: The impression of spread of bird flu was being propagated by multinational drug companies to sell their vaccine. This was claimed here on Sunday in a press conference by Pakistan Poultry Association's (layer-wing) Punjab president Chaudhry Mukhtar Ahmad.

He asserted that no evidence of spread of the disease in the province has so far been found. He said there were 18 million layer birds all over the country of which eight million were in Karachi.

Mr Mukhtar claimed that Toba Tek Singh district was the biggest producer of poultry where at least three million birds were kept by the farmers. In November last, at least 3.5 million layer birds were killed due to Rani Khet disease in Karachi but the media did not report the matter.

Now not a single bird died in the Punjab due to flu, but the false news was propagated under a conspiracy of multinationals, he added. He claimed that if the government did not stop the propaganda campaign of the multinationals, poultry farmers would face huge loss.