JHANG, Jan 31: A member of the Jhang Chamber of Commerce and Industry and 15 other persons were allegedly beaten up by Garh Maha Raja police in the presence of hundreds of terrified onlookers at the busy Garh Mor market on Jhang-Layyah-Muzaffargarh Road Tuesday afternoon.
The executive committee of the Jhang Chamber of Commerce and Industry held an emergency meeting to condemn the police highhandedness and its chairman, Dr Munawar Hussain Chaudhry, wrote a letter to the DPO demanding stern action against the SHO concerned.
When contacted, the SHO told this reporter that action was taken against the Garh Mor video shop owners as part of a campaign against the sale of obscene movies. However, he did not reply when asked about the recovery of any x-rated movie from the shops or registration of any case against the ‘culprits’.
In a written application to the DPO, pesticide-dealer Faisal Maqsood Cheema, who is a member of the chamber’s executive committee, alleged that Garh Maha Raja SHO Ghulam Mustafa had arrived at the market in plain clothes along with seven or eight officials of the police station, riding in an official vehicle.
The policeman dragged the owners of four video shops and some of the customers to the road. The officer allegedly tied the hands of the 15 “culprits” behind their backs and made them lie down on their chests at the roadside, attracting the attention of thousands of shoppers and commuters as the traffic on the busy highway came to a halt to witness the spectacle.
The officer snatched a billiard stick from a boy in a shop nearby, and started beating the exposed backs of the persons lying on the ground. The victims included 58-year-old Mohammad Aslam Asian, father of a video shop owner Qaiser Abbas.
The applicant, Faisal Maqsood Cheema, was home at that time. Informed by some shopkeepers about the ongoing drama, Mr Cheema rushed to the place and tried to persuade the furious SHO into releasing the victims and taking action against them within the ambit of the law.
Instead of listening to the applicant, the SHO allegedly started abusing him and beat him up as well. Later, the SHO took the victims to the police station, but released them without registering any cases.
The applicant also stated that no x-rated movies had been recovered from the video shops. He alleged that the traders were beaten up for refusing to pay the monthly bribe to police.
LAWYERS’ COLONY: Office bearers of Jhang Bar Association will try their utmost to persuade the provincial government to allot a suitable land for developing lawyers’ colony in the city suburbs.
This was stated by newly-elected bar president Sheikh Pervez Saeed while speaking at the first meeting of the executive committee of the bar association.
He said the allotment of residential plots in the colony of their own was a longstanding demand of Jhang lawyers as there were fully developed residential colonies of lawyers in most of the Punjab districts.
Even in Jhang, there were three colonies for executive officers in which plots were allotted to executive officers only on the basis of having served in Jhang at various times. Most of those plots, allotted at very nominal price, were later sold by their allottees at extremely profitable prices, he said.
BOOKED: Kotwali police claim to have caught red-handed a veterinary doctor and five other people while transporting substandard beef to Islamabad.
Chaudhry Ismael, assistant district officer (revenue), received an information that some butchers were trying to export unhygienic beef by a bus of Shalimar Transport Company. A raiding party was formed which caught the accused red-handed while loading the beef on the bus. Veterinary doctor Muhammad Akhtar and others offered resistance and also threatened the raiding party leader with dire consequences. A police party patrolling nearby arrested the accused.