SANGHAR, Oct 24: Police after a hot pursuit, which continued for more than 21 hours, killed six dacoits including the dreaded dacoit Ali Bux Machhi in a fierce gun battle near village Rampur on Wednesday and recovered the kidnapped Nazim of Sinjhoro Rana Anwar Rajput.

The dacoits killed the other kidnapee Ghaffar Kathiawari. This gang had stormed Sinjhoro town on Tuesday night and had killed four persons, wounded five and kidnapped two including the Nazim of UC.

A police constable Moula Bux Muhammad died and two head constables Qasim Keerio and Qasim Gahoti received bullet injuries in the encounter.

Gahoti is in serious condition with and was shifted to Hyderabad.

Police also recovered a rocket launcher, G-3 rifle, Kalashinkov rifles and a huge quantity of ammunition. The bodies were dumped at the same roundabout in Sinjhoro for display where they had danced after killing the four innocent persons. The dead dacoits were identified as Ali Bux Machhi, the gang leader, Jam Khoso, Moula Bux alias Mouloo Khaskheli and the three others, who could not be identified.

The police were led by SSP Sanghar Mr Shahid Hanif while DIG Mirpurkhas, Mr Jamal Syed Mian, had also reached and supervised the operation.

A large number of Mureeds of Pir Pagara, the district Nazim Roshan Din Junejo, taluka Nazim Rana Abdul Sattar, ex-senator Shahnawaz Junejo alongwith hundreds of their armed men also helped the police. The people of Sinjhoro which had closed their shops as protest in the morning, gave a warm welcome to SSP Sanghar Shahid Hanif, when he returned from the site of encounter to Sinjhoro alongwith the six dead dacoits, raised slogans in favour of police. The police have also arrested a person, Muhammad Ali, who according to police, was passing information to dacoits, but the villagers deny police claim.