HYDERABAD, Nov 22: The Gulshan-i-Hali police foiled an attempt of self-immolation by an office-bearer of the Asif Zardari Release Committee at Fateh Chowk here on Monday.

Latifabad taluka president of the committee Khair Mohammad Mehrani was arrested as soon as he sprinkled kerosene on his body from a soft drink bottle. He was taken to the Gulshan-i-Hali police station for questioning.

Activists of the People's Party Parliamentarians gathered there and raised slogans, demanding release of Mr Zardari, who has been granted bail in the BMW case by the Supreme Court in a sum of Rs1 million today.

Mehrani told journalists and police that local leaders of the party had been tracing him but he had made himself untraceable to them. A local party leader, Amanullah Siyal, said that the party workers had been waiting for him at the press club and Fateh Chowk when he had been arrested.

Police obtained personal bonds of Mr Siyal and Ali Ahmed Sehto in order to release Mehrani, undertaking that he would not take the extreme measure again.