LAHORE: A ‘hardened criminal’ involved in a Rs190 million house robbery in DHA a few days ago was killed in an alleged encounter with the police in Kahna early on Monday.

The shooting took place between the Kahna police and four armed car riders at Gajjumatta.

Three of the armed men managed to flee, leaving the car abandoned on the road.

CCPO Bilal Siddique Kamyana and DIG operations Faisal Kamran reached the site when it transpired that the suspect was ring leader of the notorious inter-provincial gang of more than a dozen dacoits.

They had looted many houses in DHA last year and fled to Khyber Pakhtunkhwa by dodging the law enforcers.

As per the reports, the killed robber was identified as Zazay Pathan, an Afghan national.

He and his accomplices used to target rich families, particularly, in posh areas like DHA. Police officials said when a team signalled the vehicle carrying the suspects to stop, the car riders opened fire. During an exchange of firing, a suspect was allegedly shot dead, while his accomplices escaped leaving the car abandoned on the road.

DIG Operations Faisal Kamran said the killed robber and his accomplices had some days back barged into the DHA residence of Amir Saeed, at 4:22am, holding the family members hostage in the TV lounge. They took away 200 tolas of gold, diamond jewellery worth Rs12.5m, foreign currency, and other valuables total worth approximately Rs190m from different parts of the house.

Many police teams were working on the house robbery, the DIG said adding that they kept taking help from private and safe city authority cameras to trace the gang.

The DIG said the suspects had committed robberies in many cities of Punjab.

Published in Dawn, March 17th, 2026