FAISALABAD, July 30: A brother of a candidate for a union council seat was shot dead while the aspirant himself was injured by his political rivals at Liaquatabad on Friday night. Reports said candidate for councillor’s position Malik Muhammad Yousaf and his brother, Malik Yaqoob, were stopped by three armed men who warned them against contesting polls for the union council 267.

The next moment they opened fire on the candidate and his brother as a result of which the latter died on the spot. Yousaf was grievously injured. The Jhang Bazaar police have registered a case against three nominated accused, including Nasir and Imran, who are said to be close relatives of Malik Yousaf, the rival candidate of the victim.

Meanwhile, around 163 candidates for 289 union councils in the district have charged one another with various allegations. The charges are: getting fake matriculation certificates, involvement in criminal cases, corruption, possessing illegal properties and violating code of conduct for the elections.

Meanwhile, the 44 returning officers have started scrutiny of 11,432 nomination papers filed for 3,757 seats. As many as 1,131 candidates are contesting for 578 seats of nazims and naib nazims. The candidates would have to file appeals against rejection of their papers on Aug 1 and 2 while the final list of the candidates would be displayed on Aug 5.

The election commission sources said the candidates had deposited Rs15.9 million as fee.

CLUELESS: Meanwhile, the local police are clueless about the murderers of a couple and their two adopted children even after 36 hours of the incident. Special teams have, however, been constituted by the DPO to track down the culprits.