June 22, 2007	Friday	Jamadi-us-Sani 06, 1428

PESHAWAR, June 21: Owners of two more leading video shops here have been warned of dire consequences unless they wind up the sale of video compact discs (VCDs) within two months.

Letters were sent anonymously through postal system to Shabana Videos and Bilal CD Shop in Nishtarabad on Tuesday.

Terming video centres ‘dens of obscenity and vulgarity’, the letters state: “You should learn a lesson from the treatment meted out to ‘dens of vulgarity’ in Mardan and Charssada. We give you two months’ time for winding up this business, failing which you will be responsible for all the consequences.”

Three incidents in which video shops were targeted have already occurred in the provincial capital during past three months. In two of the incidents, explosive devices went off near the video shops, while two video shops were set on fire in another incident.

Last month, two men, claiming to have come from the Lal Masjid in Islamabad, visited the office-bearers of local CD shops owners’ association and ‘asked’ them to end their businesses. Sometime later, unknown callers had made threatening calls to the organisation’s office-bearers.

The letters’ sender stated that as Muslims, it was their responsibility to eliminate vulgarity from society, adding that one should not indulge in spreading vulgarity or assist anyone in this regard.

The sender quoted a Hadith and urged the video shop owners to shut down their ‘un-Islamic’ business as it had resulted in spreading vulgarity.

Manager held : Police have arrested the manager of the Al Hilal Trust, Islamabad, after he confessed to staging a ruse by injuring himself with a pistol to swindle Rs800000 of the trust.

Speaking at a press conference on Thursday, Peshawar SSP Operations Muhammad Tahir Khan said that Khalid Omar, the manager of the trust, had shot himself in the leg with a pistol on July 19 to swindle the trust money.

The manager, he said, had reported the police that he had been injured by highway robbers who snatched Rs800,000 from him.

The SSP said that on interrogation, police found that Omar had shot himself with a pistol to plunder the amount which he later deposited in his bank account.