PESHAWAR, Sept 4: The Jamaat-i-Islami, Peshawar, has demanded that the provincial government should protect booksellers from highhandedness of district police or resign.

Speaking at a news conference at the press club on Monday, the party’s city chief MNA Sabir Hussain Awan claimed that the Kabuli police had raided various shops selling religious CDs, books and cassettes in Qissakhwani bazaar on Aug 31 and rounded up five people on charges of promoting obscenity.

He alleged that the police had harassed booksellers for selling cassettes allegedly containing objectionable material. He said that the businessmen who had been selling religious books, magazines, CDs and cassettes should not be accused of promoting objectionable material.

Mr Awan said he had gone to the Chief Minister’s House after the arrest of booksellers Ihsanullah, Hafeezullah, Iftikhar Ahmed, Tanvir Hussain, Jan Mohammad Abbasi and Rashid to brief him about the police highhandedness but he was not available.