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DERA GHAZI KHAN, March 19: A victim of allege police torture succumbed to his injuries in the Nishtar Hospital, Multan, on Friday.
Saifullah Dhandhla, 18, along with four other youngsters was picked up by Choti Zaireen police from a snooker club on Jan 2 when the police were forcing shopkeepers to close their shops for Friday prayers.
SHO Iqbal Chandia, SI Chaudhry Azhar and constables Rafiq, Atta Husain, Ghulam Ali and Farooq also beat up the youngsters. In the evening, Saif was brought to the rural health centre in a sate of coma by the police. Later, he was referred to the Dera DHQ Hospital from where he was shifted to the Nishtar where he died on Friday.
The doctors both at the RHC and the DHQ Hospital did not mention police torture in their medical reports and tried to conceal the actual facts. However, a case was registered against Azhar, Ghulam Ali, Farooq, Rafiq and Atta Husain on the directive of the police highups, and they were suspended from service. The name of the SHO was not included in the FIR.
Following the registration of the case, the nominated accused went underground. After some days, they got interim bail which was later on cancelled, and now they are in the Dera Central Jail.
SI Chaudhry Azhar is, however, on bail till March 29. Following the death of the youth, more police have been deployed in Choti besides increasing the patrol to avoid any untoward incident.
ARD: The Alliance for Restoration of Democracy has failed to agree on candidates for the by-elections in 23 union councils of the district on March 28.
According to sources, ARD's failure to evolve joint candidatures has made the run easy for the ruling Millat Party. There are 23 aspirants for five slots of UC nazim, 81 men and 10 women for the general seats and 24 men and six women for peasants' seats.
Four men and eight women have been elected unopposed on the general seats, four men and one woman on peasants' seats and one on a minorities' seat. For nazimship, Qasim Qadir Aliani of the Millat Party and Manzoor Khan Changwani of the PML-N are in the run in Choti Zaireen, Habib Leghari of the Millat Party, Liaqat Ali Rafiq of the PML-N, Bilal Sheikh of the Maqsood Leghari Group and Sajid Aziz Khetran of the PPP in the urban UC-4, Tufail Lond of the Millat Party and Habib Lond in Shadan Lond, Khwaja Ghulam Allah Bakhsh of the PML-Q, Khwaja Amin Abbas of the PPP, Muhammad Sharif of the MMA and Abdul Salam Buzdar in Taunsa Sharif and Zulfiqar Ali Nasuha and Zahoor Khan Kartani in Mangrotha.
Shabir Khan Aliani had quitted nazim's office in Choti Zaireen, Aleem Shah left the nazimship of urban UC-4 to contest the provincial assembly election on the ticket of Millat Party, Javed Akhtar Lond left nazim's seat in Shadan Lond as well as Pakistan People's Party to get a provincial assembly seat on the ticket of Millat Party while Khwaja Sheraz had left the nazimship of Taunsa as well as the PPP to contest the National Assembly election on a PML-Q ticket.
