April 09, 2008	Wednesday	Rabi-us-Sani 2, 1429

ISLAMABAD, April 8: Mystery shrouds the death of a taxi driver who apparently committed suicide in his house here on Tuesday, police said.

The police quoted the family members of Iftikhar Khan, 30, a resident of Mulpur, as claiming that he committed suicide by shooting himself with a 30-bore pistol.

However, the police said the claim of the family was in conflict with the evidence they collected from the spot. The police said they had recovered two bullet shells, blood stained bed-sheets and the weapon used in the incident from the room.

The body was handed over to the family members without conducting internal postmortem as they convinced the assistant commissioner rural that it was a suicide case, police said, adding only an external autopsy was conducted on the body.

The family members said they rushed to his room after hearing a gunshot and found him lying in a pool of blood. Later, the injured was taken to Federal Government Services Hospital where he died during treatment.

The victim’s father told the police that his son had committed suicide. However, his brother said he and other family members were not aware Khan possessed a pistol. The police said two to three days ago Iftikhar Khan gave his taxi to one of his cousins and started searching a job in Capital Development Authority, but remained unsuccessful.

The police said they had started investigation into the incident as evidence collected from the spot made it suspicious. The evidence suggested that two bullets were fired in the room, one pierced into the victim’s body and was found in it, but the other still remained untraceable.