DADU, Feb 20: Fifteen political activists were booked here on Friday for blocking Indus Highway in protest against police on Thursday, accusing them of beating a tractor driver to death.

Comrade Ali Mohammad (Pakistan People's Party-SB) Zafar Khan (PPP) Haji Abdul Nabi Jamali (Sindh National Front) Ashraf Sakhirani (Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal), transporters Hakeem Mallah, Liaquat Chachar, Ali Sher Bozdar, Ghulam Hyder Khoso, Waryal Solangi and others were nominated by the police in an FIR under section 341, 147, 148 and 149, PPC.

The complainant, ASI Mumtaz Birhamani, stated in the FIR that after the death of tractor driver Ghulam Hyder Babbur, the accused blocked the highway as a result vehicular traffic was suspended for six hours.

On the other hand, PPP MNA Rafiq Ahmed Jamali said at a press conference that the tractor driver died in police torture after an accident involving his tractor and a police mobile.

He further said that the relatives of the dead driver and the activists held a peaceful demonstration, demanding that the police should register a murder case against the police officials involved in the incident.

Jamali said that TPO Ghulam Hussain Bhutto assured the demonstrators of registering a murder case, on which the demonstrators dispersed. However, he regretted, the police had registered a case against the activists and were pressuring them to withdraw their complaint against the police officials.

He said that the relatives of the deceased filed an application in the court of district and sessions judge for registration of a murder case against ASI Allah Obhayo and four police constables.

He further said that after the application, the civil surgeon had constituted a medical board for a fresh post-mortem of the body of Hyder. He said that the DPO, under political pressure, had transferred the TPO because he was honestly investigating the case.

He threatened that if the murder case was not registered and the case against the activists was not withdrawn in three days, a strike would be observed in Dadu city which would later be extended to the entire district.

ELECTROCUTED: A boy, Arbab Ali Malookani, 12, was electrocuted in Absani village near Bhan Saeedabad on Friday.