KHAR: Firing in the air during a ceremony to celebrate award of party ticket for the National Assembly seat to a PTI leader claimed a life and left another three injured here on Sunday night, officials and locals said.

They said the incident took place in Gat Kai area of Mamond tehsil.

The officials said scores of people, most of them youths, had gathered outside the house of Gul Zafar Khan, the PTI ticket holder, to mark the development by arranging fireworks.

Quoting the Levies personnel, the officials said the fireworks were underway, when some jubilant party workers started firing in the air with Kalashnikovs, in which a person identified as Mumtaz Khan was killed. They said three others, Zidan Khan, Salman Khan and Sayed Hassan, were injured.

The wounded were later shifted to the agency headquarters hospital, Khar.

The political administration began an investigation into the incident.

Meanwhile, PTI candidate Gul Zafar Khan rejected the reports that the deceased and wounded people were hit by gunshots.

Addressing a news conference at Bajaur Press Club on Monday, he said some unknown armed men had attacked the people at the ceremony.

He claimed that he knew the elements who attacked the peaceful people, and asked the local administration to conduct a fair inquiry into the incident.

Published in Dawn, June 5th, 2018