LAHORE, May 18: Two buses of a South Korean transport company were burnt on Friday in Samanabad and Green Town owing to reasons yet to be established.

The police lodged two separate FIRs against the assailants under the Anti-Terrorism Act on the complaints of the drivers of the burnt buses.

Samanabad police lodged a case against unidentified assailants while Quaid-i-Azam Industrial Area police nominated some 16 activists of Islami Jamiat Tulaba and their four unidentified accomplices in the FIR.

Witnesses said a group of six to eight unidentified motorcyclists, some of them armed with weapons, intercepted a Daewoo bus near Samanabad Mor. They forced the passengers to dismount from the bus, sprinkled petrol and burnt it almost completely.

The witnesses said the assailants also resorted to aerial firing creating panic among the passengers and other local residents besides traders, shopkeepers and businessmen who rushed for shelter.

Quoting initial investigation, Iqbal Town Division SP Abdul Ghaffar Qaisrani told Dawn apparently it seemed that the bus was ‘targeted’ by the attackers of an organised faction or group. He did not name the faction involved.

To a question about the involvement of activists of IJT, he said the investigations were under way to establish their (students) link to this incident.

He said a case was registered against six to eight unidentified men on the complaint of bus driver Sher Agha under Section 7 of ATA and under sections 436, 148, 149, 427, 337 and H-2 of the Pakistan Penal Code (PPC).

Sadar Division SP Athar Waheed said the attackers stopped a bus of Daewoo, threw petrol on it and burnt it almost completely. The assailants later fled the scene, he said.

He said the modus operandi of the attackers was similar to that of Samanabad where the assailants torched another bus of the same transport company.

Mr Waheed said Quaid-i-Azam Industrial Area police had registered an FIR against 16 nominated students of the IJT and four unidentified students of the same organization.

The SP said the FIR was lodged under 7-ATA. He, however, refused to disclose the names of the IJT activists nominated in the FIR.