MUZAFFARABAD, July 31: Hectic efforts initiated on Monday morning to retrieve the body of Alhaj Ashraf Qureshi, slain chairman of Traders Joint Action Committee, bore results on Thursday evening when his body was found in Mangla Dam in the southern Mirpur district, police said.

Mr Qureshi was murdered in cold blood by a local resident with the help of two hired assassins from Punjab, over a petty property dispute, on July 24 and his body was thrown into River Jhelum near Gujjar Kohala, some 35 kilometres south of here.

However, the news about his murder broke on Sunday evening after the police successfully arrested and investigated the mastermind of heinous crime and his accomplices. Efforts to fish out Mr Qureshi's body were initiated by the police as well as residents of Muzaffarabad since Monday morning and initially the wretched tin-sheet box and a blood stained blanket were retrieved from the river in Gujjar Kohala. However, the body was believed to have flown to the Mangla Dam.

All police stations and police posts along River Jhelum were directed to carry out patrols beside the riverbank as well as the Mangla reservoir to locate the body and the Dadyal police station efforts yielded results on Thursday evening. DIG Muzaffarabad region Faheem Ahmed Khan told Dawn that a police patrol led by SHO Dadyal police station Mirza Shaukat had spotted the body at the mouth of Mangla Dam near Thalla Raj Wali village. —Staff Correspondent