FAISALABAD, July 12: Satiana Road Rex Market traders who gave an “eye-witness” account of a brawl between an ASP and the People’s Colony SHO, held the latter guilty.

Speaking at a news conference here on Saturday, market leaders Mian Yasir Manna, Malik Jaafar Raza, Mian Muhammad Rafi and others claimed that SHO Mehmood Sardar had rounded up four traders of the Rex Market and tortured them physically in a private torture cell to “extort from them Rs 100,000”. They claimed that the SHO had demanded the bribe through his gunman and tout Liaqat Ali.

“We approached ASP Shahzad Sultan for the release of the detainees. The ASP asked the SHO to produce the arrested before him but he started abusing his boss which led to a physical fight between the two.”

The traders further claimed that the SHO, instead of releasing the four traders, had implicated them in a theft case.

They sought action against the SHO for confining the traders illegally. They also demanded the release of the traders and the withdrawal of false cases against them.