Eight dacoits were killed in an operation in Kashmore’s riverine area, near the Sindh-Punjab border, on Friday, according to local police.

Shikarpur Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Amjad Ahmed Shaikh, who is also the acting Kashmore SSP, told Dawn.com that eight dacoits with bounties on their heads were killed in the operation.

He said the slain dacoits also included Soomar Shar, whose brother was allegedly killed by Ghotki police last year.

SSP Shaikh said Sindh police had trapped the gang by organising a party through a mutual associate who hosted the dacoits but was communicating with the Kashmore police.

According to Shaikh, the dacoits were involved in honey trap cases and one among them, Janu, used to lure prospective hostages to the riverine area in order to hold them captive.

Meanwhile, police from Punjab claimed that one of the slain men was actually their informant, Usman Chandio.

“He was present in the party when the dacoits were ambushed with his help,” Rahimyar Khan SSP Rizwan Umar Gondal told Dawn.com.

“Police in Kashmore did not provide us with an armoured personnel carrier and so, he was brutally killed by dacoits when he tried to flee. The video of his murder has gone viral,” the SSP said.

Gondal maintained that Chandio resided in Rahim Yar Khan, in Zahir Pir police station’s precinct, and had served a jail term with Jamil Indher, Janu’s brother. He added that the Rahim Yar Khan police could not retrieve his body.

A grand operation is currently under way in Sindh’s riverine areas to clear them of dacoits. The operation was approved by the Sindh cabinet in March.

Earlier this month, Sindh Inspector General of Police Ghulam Nabi Memon had said that most-wanted dacoits were being killed in ambushes, carried out on the basis of intelligence reports.