GUJRAT, March 13: Unidentified men shot dead four personnel of Gujrat police at a picket near Kathala railway crossing, some 12 kilometres away from here on Tuesday night.

The assailants equipped with sophisticated weapons came on two motorcycles and opened fire, killing constables Seerat Abbas, Qamar Butt and Sibghat Azam on the spot while injuring picket in charge, head-constable Muhammad Arshad, who succumbed to wounds in Aziz Bhatti Shaheed DHQ Hospital. One of the constables deployed at the picket, however, remained unhurt.

DPO Rana Shahid Pervez rushed to the spot after the incident. He said that motive behind the unprovoked firing was yet to be ascertained. The bodies were also sent for autopsies.

The Kathala picket has been one of the key and oldest pickets of the Gujrat police located between the Kathala railway crossing and the river Chenabs bridge. CM:

Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif is due in Gujrat on Thursday (tomorrow). He will be the chief guest in the laptop distribution ceremony at the University of Gujrat.

Assistant Commissioner Wasif Basheer Khokhar told newsmen at a briefing that the Punjab CM would also lay the foundation stone for the construction of Nawaz Sharif Medical Colleges campus on the land adjacent to UOG. Currently the classes of the NSMC are being conducted at the Hafiz Hayat Campus of the UOG.

Latter on Mian Shahbaz Sharif will inaugurate a model Bazaar established at the GT Road in front of the general bus stand.

Sources told Dawn that most of the expenditures of CM's visit had already been tasked to the officials of Tehsil Municipal Administration, Gujrat.