SWABI: Transgender leaders here on Saturday declared that they would resist any bid to expel their community’s members from the district.

Last month, the police arrested over 225 people, including transgender persons, near Swabi city police station over refusal to abandon a musical event.

District head of the Swabi Transgenders Association Sidra Gultold Dawn that soon after the arrests, representatives of trangender persons held meetings with police officials and the 11-member committee formed to expel them from the district over dance performances.

Accompanied by other association members, she said people invited them to such functions, with dance performances being their source of livelihood.

“In a meeting with DSP of Swabi City Ijaz Khan Abazai, we promised not to be involved in any activity which harms the peaceful atmosphere of the district,” she said. She said she hoped that more and more musical shows would be held across the district after a gap of a few months.

“I want to make it very clear that we [transgender persons] are very peaceful people and will remain so in the future as well,” she said.

ONE KILLED: Gunmen killed a man near Janazgah here on Saturday.

Rescue 1122official Luqman Khan told Dawn that the body of Asif Nawaz was shifted to the Bacha Khan Teaching Hospital in Shahmansoor.

The man was attacked when he was taking his sister to the school.

His father, Sherzada, told police that his family had no enmity and would name killers after “investigation.”

Police said they had collected evidence from the crime site and started an investigation. No arrest was made until night.

Published in Dawn, October 26th, 2025