PESHAWAR: A Nowshera family has blamed the local police of supporting a crimnals’ group and demanded of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Chief Minister Pervez Khattak and IGP Nasir Khan Durrani to order the arrest of the gangsters and help recover the stolen valuables from them.

Speaking at a news conference at the Peshawar Press Club on Wednesday, Zar Ali, a driver, accompanied by his wife, children and other relatives, said that a group of armed men led by Alif Shah and Wahid Shah of Madi Baba Mardan had broken into his house on the night of Aug 3 and decamped with a van, Rs100,000, two tola jewellery and a telephone set.

“We couldn’t identify the armed men as they were wearing masks, but some days later a source gave me a tip-off about the robbers,” said Zar Ali, adding that when he contacted the robbers they demanded another Rs450,000 for return of the vehicle.

He said that he along with relatives, Nisar Khan and Niaz Mohammad, gave the robbers the extortion money, but instead of returning the vehicle they took out guns at them.

Zar Ali said that the van (LWC-5984) valued at about Rs2.5million which was his family’s only source of income. Of the eight gangsters, he said three, including Shakir, Wajid and Mohammad Sadiq, had been arrested but their ringleaders Ali Shah and Eed Mohammad were still roaming freely and sending him life threats.

The gangsters, he said had forced him to vacate his own house due to life threats and shifted to a comparatively safer place as he had young daughters and could not take the risk. He blamed the local police for supporting the accused persons, thus making his and his family family’s lives miserable. Niaz and Nisar, who were also present in the press conference, said that the dacoits were members of an organised group involved in extortion, robberies and other crimes.

Published in Dawn, October 30th , 2014