SHIKARPUR: Three more people were killed and several others, including children, were wounded on Sunday as Mehran Bijarani village in the riverine area of Khanpur was attacked with rockets and guns by a group of tribesmen and the villagers retaliated with a counter-attack.

The clash was attributed to the hostility between the Teghani and Bijarani tribes of Shikarpur over the ownership of a piece of land and theft of cattle heads. The enmity had started some four years ago and has already claimed more than 25 lives in similar attacks and counter-attacks in the area.

The SHO said that the Bijranis repulsed the attack killing one of the attackers, Nanoo Teghani, and wounding four others.

The attackers took away their wounded associates under the cover of heavy firing, he said.

Police believed that the group of armed attackers belonged to the Teghani tribe. Napar Kot SHO Nadir Ali Mugheri said that the attack on the village, located some 80 kilometres from Shikarpur city, was carried out by more than 15 heavily armed men. They fired rockets on some houses of Bijaranis besides using heavy guns, he added.

Six people were seriously wounded in the attack and two of them, Miandad Bijarani, 25, and Shahnawaz Bijarani, 30, died before getting any medical assistance. Their close relatives, Dost Mohammed, Mohammed Jalil, seven-year-old Sajan, and eight-year-old Mehboob, were rushed to the civil hospitals of Shikarpur and Sukkur due to their precarious condition.

The police moved into the troubled area to bring the situation under control, the SHO said, adding that they collected the three bodies and transported them to the Khanpur taluka hospital for a post-mortem examination.

An FIR of the clash was not registered at the police station till late in the evening.

Published in Dawn, July 30th, 2018