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FAISALABAD, Aug 25: People went to the local polls amid armed clashes, which cast their shadow in most of the union councils across Punjab. Several voters were killed and a good number of people injured in the clashes thanks to unbridled use of weapons by the supporters of the candidates. Some hopefuls and their goons were among the victims.
The excessive display of arms pointed to the failure of the operations and preventions police, who could not properly manage a crackdown on illegal use of weapons before the polling.
Three people were killed and 19 others hurt in clashes that took place in Faisalabad.
Reports said Ali Sher, Muhammad Iqbal and Muhammad Imran were going to cast their vote for Union Council No 72 nazim candidate Bahadur Khan at Chak 436-GB in Satiana when some armed men of the rival candidate, Muhammad Bakhsh, shot them dead.
Scuffles were also reported from 23 UCs of city, Samundri, Tandlianwala, Satiana and Jaranwala where 19 people were injured. Three of them were taken to the Allied Hospital in critical condition.
The supporters indulged in petty disputes and brawls over setting up of election camps, sloganeering and visiting the native areas of rival candidates.
The Civil Lines police rounded up 16 violators, including nazim slot aspirant Tauheed Shahid, the son of PPP MPA Riaz Shahid. They also registered four cases against some aspirants and their men for violating the election code.
NAROWAL: Three people were shot dead and another injured by the firing of their rival political group at Kotla Afghanan village in Langah union council, Shakargarh tehsil (Narowal).
Safdar Khan, Riaz Nanha and their driver were on their way to a polling station by a car when six armed men sprayed the vehicle with bullets. As a result, Safdar died on the spot while the other two suffered injuries. They were admitted to the Shakargarh THQ hospital where Riaz succumbed to injuries.
According to another report, Abadullah, a candidate for Langah UC nazim, was also injured in the attack.
According to the Narowal police, the deceased belonged to Punjab Health Minister Chaudhry Tahir Ali Javed’s group while the assailants were NRB chairman Daniyal Aziz’s men. A youth, Waqas Akram, was killed by his opponents at Khatana Shah Gharib village.
Some 15 people snatched four ballot boxes at gunpoint from the polling station at Pindi Kalan village and as many boxes from Chak Bahauddin village station in Shakargarh’s Kalla UC. The intruders reportedly held the entire polling staff hostage and fled firing in the air.
Again the supporters of the Dr Tahir and Daniyal Aziz’s groups were involved.
Meanwhile, Capt Muhammad Ali (retired) and Chaudhry Amanat Ali were grievously injured in an exchange of fire between two rival groups at the Prel UC polling station in Pasrur tehsil (Sialkot). Re-polling in Sialkot district’s 10 rural union councils — two in Sialkot and eight in Pasrur — was held. The polling remained suspended at Prel and several other polling stations in Pasrur owing to various election disputes.
The Sabzpeer police arrested 11 suspects, including UC nazim hopeful Muhammad Ali, from Prel village, Sialkot DPO Osama Mumtaz Raja told journalists. He said the police recovered fire ammunition in quantity, which were to be used for re-polling. The suspects were sent behind bars.
OKARA: A man was shot dead in firing at a Haveli Lakha polling station between two rival groups.
Information gleaned by Dawn revealed that in the urban Haveli Lakha UC, two rival groups traded fire as a result of which Muhammad Irshad died.
After the incident a mob started hurling stones at the police, injuring sub-inspector Mirza Alamgir, the SHO of Haveli Lakha police station. He was hospitalized.
Reports pouring in from several other places also revealed aerial firing by rival candidates. Two persons escaped with minor injuries.
GUJRAT: A guard of MPA Tasneem Nasir Chaudhry was shot dead while scores of others, including former MPA Mushtaq Husain Pagganwala and his son Fakhar Pagganwala, were injured in election-related violence in Jhelum, Gujrat and Mandi Bahauddin districts.
The polling remained suspended for hours at various polling stations.
Reports said the men of MPA Tasneem Nasir and MNA Raja Asad Afzal exchanged fire at the Kharala polling station in UC-10 (Chak Khasa) in Jhelum. Guards Liaquat Ali and Noshi Butt of the MPA and MNA’s guard Wazir Khan were grievously wounded. Liaquat, later, succumbed to his injuries.
In UC-17 at Kala Gujran polling station (Jhelum), naib nazim candidate Abdur Rasheed’s polling agent Sajid was clubbed and injured by goons of a rival candidate. While in UC-57 in Gujrat, ruling PML candidate Kashif Raza Haideri’s supporters opened fire on rival candidate Malik Imran Sharif and his men at a polling station in Islamnagar. MPA Mian Mushtaq Pagganwala, his son Fakhar, Malik Imran, Rizwan Ali, Rizwan Butt, Usman, Zeeshan, Aurangzeb and Afzal suffered injuries.
Muhammad Siddique of the Haideri group also suffered bullet wounds when the victim Imran group retaliated.
Eyewitnesses claimed that the Haideri group was busy in rigging and the rival candidate tried to stop them, which led to bloodletting.
PML-N nazim candidate Haji Nasir alleged that men of rival candidate Raja Sikandar and Amir Nadeem Chaudhry resorted to aerial firing at the UC-53 polling station to harass the polling staff. They committed irregularities after forcibly removing the staff. It is pertinent to mention that UC-53 is the native constituency of the Chaudhrys.
In Dinga, UC-108, 10 men were clubbed and injured in a clash between Nosherwan and Habib Basri groups and in UC-22 at Chak Manju polling station, Ahsan of Iqbal group shot at and injured Javed.
Other reports of massive rigging and aerial firing by men of the ruling PML were reported from Kathala, Ditawala, Gorali, Lehari and Kalra.
Ghulam Abbas was shot at and injured by men of the rival candidate at Chak Basawa polling station in Mandi Bahauddin.
HAFIZABAD: Violence was at its worst in Hafizabad where a man was shot dead and nine people injured with polling disrupted many times in a day.
Two rival groups exchanged fire at Pindi Dhodal village as a result of which Afzal died and five other people suffered injuries. The polling in eight villages remained suspended for an hour owing to fighting among different groups of candidates.
Madan Philla village polling station saw disruption in the voting when a candidate, Khalid Haroon, fled with stamps after throwing ink in a ballot box. It was learnt that the box was empty.
The polling was stopped at Tunni village when a rival group threw stone at the polling station. At Deelaywali village, one Shahid was shot at and injured in yet another incident of firing. The police arrested five people with unlicensed weapons.
TOBA TEK SINGH: One person was injured in an exchange of fire between the supporters of two candidates for the slot of UC No 56 nazim at Kamal Chowk here on Thursday.
Injured Jabbar, a cousin of candidate Advocate Afzal, was hospitalized. Police had to baton charge to disperse the people who had gathered at the chowk. However, army and police personnel have been posted in the area.
Meanwhile, Kamalia city police arrested two people from Eidgah with over 24 fake stamps of Nadra district registrars and some old national identity cards besides hundreds of blank cards.
During investigation, Munir Ahmad and Tariq said they were preparing the cards for the candidates of different union councils.
ELECTED UNOPPOSED: Qasim Manzoor was elected UC-45 nazim unopposed when his only rival, Rana Sajjad Munir, failed to deposit a Rs1.3 million default money with a bank.
He was allowed by the Supreme Court to deposit his default amount by Aug 24, but he failed to do so. As a result, Qasim was elected unopposed.
