April 06, 2008	Sunday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 28, 1429

KARACHI, April 5: Three teenagers drowned on Saturday in two separate incidents in different parts of the city, witnesses and police said.

Witnesses said that about 60 students of the Iqra School, Korangi, had come to the artificial lake at the Quaid-i-Azam Park in Steel Town on the National Highway for a picnic. One of them, Owais, overbalanced and fell into the lake.

His friend, Abdullah, jumped into the lake to rescue him but he also drowned.

Later, a large number of people, including families of the picnickers, gathered outside the park, raised slogans and disrupted the vehicular traffic when the park administration refused to allow them into the park while efforts were under way to fish out the bodies. Police baton-charged the protesters to bring the situation under control.

Pakistan Navy divers were trying to fish out the body till last reports came in.

In Sherpao Colony, Landhi, a 13-year-old boy, Tamraiz Khan, drowned in a pond off Mehran Highway. The pond had developed due to the leakage from a pipeline being laid by the KWSB. Enraged residents of the area held a violent protest against the KWSB contractor and torched his two makeshift offices.

A case was registered on the complaint of the victim’s father.