BAHAWALNAGAR: District Bar Association (DBA) members remained away from courts on Thursday against unannounced loadshedding and also staged a rally from the bar office to the DC office.

They held banners inscribed with slogans against Mepco for observing 18-hour power breakdowns. They demanded that the duration of loadshedding not only be reduced but civil and sessions courts also be exempted from loadshedding.

DBA President Kashif Khakwani said lawyers took to the streets against the plight of citizens and would extend their protest if unannounced loadshedding in Bahawalnagar continued.

Traders also warned of a strike. Traders Association’s district general secretary Sohail Khan said that the electricity disappeared after every hour and in some areas, the duration swelled to 18 hours a day.

He said the government had failed to overcome power outages despite the early closure of markets.

KIDNAPPED: A retired police official has appealed to the IGP for the recovery of his daughter, who was allegedly kidnapped from Minchinabad on June 28 by four men in a car when she was returning home from university.

Abdul Rahman, a retired police constable of the Bhagwanpura area, said his 19-year-old daughter is studying at the IUB, Bahawalnagar Campus. He said that according to eyewitnesses, the kidnappers took her to the Mcleod Ganj area in the car as soon as she landed from the passenger bus in Minchinabad lorry adda.

He said that a case was registered with the Minchinabad police. SHO Shabbir Shah claimed that police had found clues about the girl and hoped to recover her within 24 hours.

MURDER: A bullet-riddled body of a teenage boy, who went missing a day ago, was found in front of a house in Chishtian here on Wednesday night, the family said.

Junaid Tahir, of Chak 14/Gajyani, left his house on Tuesday night but did not return. The deceased’s uncle Abdul Ghaffar told Chishtian A-Division police he might be killed by the family of the girl.

The police registered a murder case.

Published in Dawn, July 1st, 2022