KOHAT: Three members of a family including a woman were killed and one person was injured in Sheri Mela area of Junglekhel here on Monday over an old enmity, police and witnesses said.

The accused managed to escape after the armed attack, which created panic in the area and people in the street rushed to their homes to avoid harm.

The victim’s family nominated Irfan, Adnan, and Ikram sons of Umer Farooq in the FIR. The killers had earlier gunned down four people of the same family two years back.

The victims included Sarfraz, Mohib and Farhat Bibi, while Nauman was injured from the attackers’ side. The victims had no automatic weapons while their rivals were armed with Kalashnikovs.

The victims were returning from the courts after hearing in an old case when the attacker waiting for them came out on motorcycles and opened fire, killing three people.

Meanwhile, the woman who lost her son, daughter, and a nephew in the attack said that a jirga was being arranged to end the enmity but the rival party cheated us. She alleged that the police were hand in glove with the killers.

Later, the family members of the victims set on fire the house of the killers and put the dead bodies on the main bypass road demanding immediate arrest of the killers, who had earlier killed four members of the same family two years back.

The SP operations, Zahid Khan, reached the spot and started negotiations with the protesters to end their protest and open the road to traffic.

The Rescue 1122 also responded swiftly and put out the fire and shifted the bodies and injured person to the KDA hospital for autopsy and treatment.

An elder of the area said that it was a classic example of justice delayed because had the people who had killed four people two years back been awarded punishment, they would not have dared to kill three more.

Published in Dawn, September 26th, 2023