PESHAWAR, Oct 18: The severed heads of a senior police officer and a soldier of Frontier Constabulary were found in Gulshanabad area of Matani on the suburbs of Peshawar early on Thursday, sources said.

The militants had slaughtered Superintendent of Police Khurshid Khan and another FC man identified as Mohammad Diyar on Sunday night during an attack on Ghaziabad police post in the limits of Matani police station.

A police source said that both the heads, packed in a bag, were hanging at the veranda of a market. The residents of the area informed police about the presence of severed heads of law enforcers. Police took them into custody and after postmortem handed them over to heirs for burial, he added.

He said that movement of police and security forces was increased in Matani, Darwazgai and adjacent areas to improve law and order situation on the outskirts of the provincial metropolis. A villager, pleading anonymity, told Dawn that the attack on Ghaziabad post, manned jointly by police and FC, had caused panic among the people and they were feeling insecure.

“We are unable to express our feelings in public as nobody knows about the informers of militants and police. The best option for people like us is to remain silent or avoid sitting in the bazaars,” he said.

The villager said that in the past shopkeepers used to keep their shops open even after evening but the attack prompted them to pull down the shutters before the sunset to avoid any untoward incident.

Referring to the increasing activities of militants, he said that security forces should support police at the entry points otherwise law enforcers would not be able to control the situation. DSP Fazl Wahid Khan, however, said that the heads were found in an open area outside Matani Bazaar. “We are making efforts to arrest all those involved in the heinous crime but so far no one has been arrested in this connection,” he said. About the operation cleanup against militants in the suburban localities, the DSP said that it was essential but timeframe could not be given as it depended on the high ups of the department.

It is to be mentioned here that the post of SP Rural has been vacant since the tragic incident and the duty has been assigned to a DSP. Similarly, the post of Peshawar SSP is also vacant as SSP Tahir Ayub has gone on leave in connection with a professional course and the additional charge has been assigned to SP City Asif Iqbal. Efforts were made to contact the acting SSP but he could not be approached by the telephone.