KOHAT: The city police recovered a cache of illegal weapons from a shop in Bannu Bazaar here and arrested the owner during a raid on Tuesday.

SHO Hamayun Khan said the raiding team seized 12 pistols, six shotguns, a rifle and 19 chargers. He said shop owner, Mudassar Iqbal had smuggled the arms from Darra Adamkhel. The police registered a case against him.

In a separate development, the cantonment police arrested six persons and recovered illegal weapons and drugs from the car they were travelling in on the Ublan Road on Tuesday.

SHO Amjid Hussain said the seizure included a Kalashnikov, a pistol and cartridges, and three kilogrammes of hashish.

He said five of the accused belonged to Karak and one to Orakzai. The police registered a case against them.

Also on Tuesday, the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Food Safety and Halal Food Authority officials sealed a manufacturing unit of a bakery and imposed a Rs15,000 fine on the owner for not maintaining hygiene.

Food safety officer Rizwan Wazir said the raiding team also disposed of 50 kilogrammes of substandard ghee and food colours found in the unit.

He said the officials also imposed Rs15,000 fine each on two bakeries for selling substandard items.

SECURITY PLAN: The local authorities have deployed 1,500 policemen in bazaars and at religious places under a security plan finalised for the last 10 days of Ramazan.

District police officer Sohail Khalid, in a statement on Tuesday, said the police had also hired services of the army for strict implementation of the plan.

The DPO said police had increased patrolling and snap checking at the entrance and exit points of the district and on the city roads. He said duty hours of traffic wardens had been increased to ensure smooth flow of traffic.

Separately, a cartridge factory caught fire in Saroor Mela Bazaar of Darra Adamkhel on Tuesday due to short-circuiting.

Rescue 1122 firefighters dozed off the flame. No human loss was reported as workers were evacuated from the unit. However, damage was caused to property.

OPEN FORUM: Orakzai deputy commissioner Mohammad Khalid on Tuesday listened to public complaints online and directed the departments concerned to address the people’s problems within one week.

Heads of the departments showed up in his office.

He directed the officials to redress problems of people relating to health, education, water and electricity.

Published in Dawn, May 5th, 2021