MANSEHRA: Five persons, including a couple, were killed in separate incidents here, the police said on Wednesday.

They said a man and his wife were killed over petty dispute in the Buzdandi village of Pulrah area on Tuesday night. They said Mohammad Hanif and Mohammad Israel exchanged fire after the former’s cattle entered the latter’s agricultural fields. The police said Israel and his wife, who came to rescue him, received gunshots and were shifted to King Abdullah Teaching Hospital, where doctors pronounced them dead.

The Pulrah police lodged an FIR, and started making raids to arrest the accused.

Meanwhile, a proclaimed offender, identified as Khan Afsar, was killed by unidentified assailants in the Danna area of Pulrah. The police registered an FIR, and began efforts to arrest the assailants.

Separately, two youngsters were killed when wall of a house collapsed in the Chatterplain area.

The deceased, Sher Azam and Abu Bakar, were playing in the street when the wall fell on them.

Locals retrieved both of them from the rubble and shifted them to a health facility, where doctors pronounced them dead.

CNG STATIONS REOPEN: A large number of vehicles thronged the CNG stations after they reopened early on Wednesday following their closure for 18 hours.

SNGPL had suspended supply to the CNG stations across the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa under the gas load management plan.

Mohammad Basit, a CNG station operator, told reporters that he was unaware of what exactly led to the gas loadshedding.

BAN ON FIRING IN AIR: The district administration on Wednesday imposed Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, banning firing in the air on the Chand Raat and sale of firecrackers and toy guns.

Speaking to reporters, additional deputy commissioner (relief) Assad Lodhi said all such activities which could cause any mishap and law and order situation anywhere in the district had been banned.

He said the contraveners would be taken to the justice under Section 188 of the Pakistan Penal Code.

PEACE BODY: Residents of Balakot, including clerics, local government representatives and traders, on Wednesday constituted a committee tasked with retrieving the weapons from the people, who had taken them away from the Balakot police station after ransacking it following the killing of a TikToker by a policeman earlier this month.

“The protesters should return the arms at all costs or the law would take its due course,” Maulana Qazi Noman Khalil, head of the committee, told reporters.

He said the committee would help restore ‘friendly’ relations between the police and the Balakot residents.

Published in Dawn, March 19th, 2026