GUJRANWALA, Aug 31: Scores of villagers on Tuesday injured a court bailiff and three other people, who raided a landlord's house to get a woman and her daughter freed from his custody at Dera Shah Jamal village.

Reports said Bashir Ahmad approached the district and sessions judge and pleaded that his relative Ruqaya Bibi and her daughter Aqsa Bibi had been abducted by landlord Abdul Rashid over a litigation dispute.

The court inducted Maqbool Shah as bailiff and directed him to recover the detenu from the landlord's custody. As the bailiff raided the house of the landlord along with complainant and others, some 70 assailants attacked them with iron rods and axes and injured four people. They took away the woman and her daughter to an unknown place.

Later, police arrested four of the assailants, identified as Muhammad Naveed, Muhammad Akram, Muhammad Altaf and Muhammad Afzal, and took into custody their car (LHJ-4133). They have registered a case against the suspects and are conducting raids to arrest the remaining men.

BAN LIFTED: Accepting the request of the local drama producers' association, the Punjab home department on Tuesday lifted ban on dance performances by female artistes but warned that they should be properly dressed.

Reports said the association had filed an appeal with the home department against the decision of the district administration to ban performances by female artistes to check obscenity in theatres few months ago.

The department has now lifted the ban, but directed the association to make sure that the dancers wear proper dress. When contacted, Gujranwala art council director Niaz Husain Lakhwera said he had yet to receive any such order by the home department.