03 October 2004	Sunday	17 Shaban 1425

GUJRANWALA, Oct 2: Scores of crews and owners of wagons on Saturday threw traffic out of gear on the GT Road in protest against the district administration and the RTA secretary for withdrawing about 500 wagons to the benefit of franchized buses.

They also chanted slogans against the transport department and owners of the franchized buses. The protesters gathered on the GT Road and also stopped a franchized bus.

The protesters accused that the transport department was responsible for rendering 300,000 people jobless. They demanded that wagons should be allowed on the GT Road along with the franchized buses.

Later, they set up a hunger strike camp at Ghakkhar town and displayed banners and placards inscribed with slogans against the transport department and district administration. The police, however, uprooted the protest camp and also took away their tents.

Meanwhile, commuters including women and children are forced to travel on packed to capacity buses due to the less number of franchized buses.

The public transport situation worsened when the RTA abolished Wazirabad-bound wagon stand at local general bus stand.

About 40 franchized buses were being plied from Kamoki to Ghakkhar town which were insufficient for 20,000 passengers who used to travel daily between Ghakkhar to Gujranwala.

Bid foiled: The National Highway and Motorway Police on Saturday caught a person red-handed when he was trying to hijack a bus for dacoity near Kamoki.

Reports said the accused boarded the Lahore-bound vehicle posing himself as passenger. He held hostage bus driver Ashraf at gunpoint and asked him to take the vehicle towards some deserted place.

Meanwhile, the motorway police stopped the bus on GT Road when a passenger informed them by mobile phone. They took the accused into custody and later handed him over to district police along with his pistol.