Two killed, four injured in armed clash

Police say both the parties have yet to file an FIR

ISLAMABAD: An uptick in violent incidents in recent weeks saw the capital’s murder rate hit 50 mark this year, as two people were gunned down in a clash between two groups on Sunday. Police said the groups clashed over a land dispute in Malpur, a village located just outside the capital city and a few hundred meters from Lake View Park on Murree Road.

The clash left two men dead, one from each side, and another four injured. The dead were identified as 45-year-old Raja Rashid Kiani and 35-year-old Chaudhry Rehmat. Medico legal officials said both died of injuries from pellets of 12-bore guns. Rehmat received four gunshot injuries to his head while Kiani’s torso was riddled with pellets, they added. The bodies were handed over to respective families after their post-mortem examinations at the Polyclinic hospital. Both the victims were Malpur locals.

Another man, identified as Irfan, was critically injured in the clash and is admitted in the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences.

Police were still busy in medico-legal formalities and an FIR was yet to be registered when this report was filed on Sunday evening. Neither had anybody been arrested yet. “We have received no application for registration of an FIR yet from any side and have made no arrests,” a police officer said.

With Sunday’s double-murder, the total homicide cases registered by the capital police so far this year have risen to 50, eight of them reported in this month only.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 24^th, 2017.