Wanted man caught from MPA’s dera

Saddar Elite force teams arrest a proclaimed offender and also recover weapons from him.

FAISALABAD: Saddar Elite force teams arrested a proclaimed offender and also recovered weapons from him. The man was arrested from the dera (outhouse) of a PML-N MPA, Ajmal Asif.

Thekri wala police has registered an illegal weapons case against the proclaimed offender. “We caught Riaz from the exact location that we were told we would find him. He was living very comfortably and it was clear that he was being provided asylum,” Sheikh said.

Riaz has been sent to an undisclosed location and police officials have said that they are waiting for the court hearing to present him.

According to police officials, ASP Sheikh received a tip-off indicating that Ajmal Asif was providing shelter to Riaz, a man wanted by the police. The police then raided the MPA’s outhouse on Jhang Road and apprehended the man. “We received an anonymous call and were told that the MPA was protecting a proclaimed offender,” Sheikh said. “We have been looking for Riaz for nearly two years. He is wanted for his involvement in several counts of murder, manslaughter and robbery,” he said.

According to police officials, in 2008, a brawl occurred over labourers’ salaries in Ajmal Asif’s factory and the body of a labourer was found in the factory after a few days. “The incident was hushed up. Nobody came forward and the accused escaped,” ASP Sheikh said. He said that at the time, the police were told by some of the labourers that a group of labourers had been ‘paid off’ to keep them quiet.

“The workers told us that Riaz and a couple of other men had threatened them not to go through with the protests and when they did, a man ended up dead,” he said. ASP Sheikh said that Riaz had been the primary accused in the case. “We suspected that he was moving about from one place to another. We never thought that he was being given shelter here,” the ASP said.

On the other hand, MPA Ajmal Asif has denied all knowledge of a raid and said that no one had entered his outhouse without his permission. “There has been no raid and there was no proclaimed offender. This is a media conspiracy to ruin my reputation and malign the name of the PML-N,” Asif said.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 24^th, 2010.