HAFIZABAD, July 31: Rice bags worth Rs70 million mortgaged with a bank have been ‘plundered’, according to reports.

Murad and Company and Ali Abbas and Company had pledged 15,847 rice bags in lieu of Rs30 million loan each with the National Bank of Pakistan’s Jalalpur Bhattian branch.

Reports said some armed men, including Chaudhry Qadir Bakhsh Tarar and Saifullah Aslam Hayat, overpowered the watchmen of the bank’s godown and took away the rice bags.

On the directives of Additional District and Sessions Judge Rana Aftab Ahmad, the police have registered a case against 24 suspects, many of them agents of the companies in question.

STRIKE: Traders announced on Thursday that they would observe a three-day shutter-down strike against unscheduled loadshedding.