LAHORE, July 9: Police on Sunday shot dead a schoolboy at a picket at Paikhewal Morr in Allama Iqbal Town.

The boy was killed hours before Punjab IGP Ziaul Hasan Khan’s statement ordering his force to initiate general hold-up for, what he believed, tightening noose around criminals.

The force was quick enough to respond to the call of duty and shot at three schoolboys on a motorcycle at a picket.

One and a half month ago, the police had shot dead an engineering student in Faisal Town. Zeeshan, a resident of Okara and the only son of an expatriate, was going with a friend to his flat early morning when a police patrol signalled them to stop. He was shot dead when he tried to speed away.

The latest police victim was Salman Ejaz, a 9th class student. He and his friends Asghar and Fraz went to a market in Allama Iqbal Town to eat something. They were on their way back to Naseerabad when policemen at a picket signalled them to stop. The schoolboys took a little time to obey the order. One of the policemen armed with a kalashnikov opened fire on the boys and injured two of them.

The injured boys, according to sources, fell from the motorcycle, but the police concocted a story, saying that they sped away. The police said that the boys were rounded up by the Hanjarwal SPO who got the injured admitted to the Jinnah Hospital and took the third one into custody.

Salman died in the hospital while the other boy was stated to be in critical condition. The arrested boy was taken to Allama Iqbal Town police station.

One of the boys’ family members belonged to the Shabab-i-Milli whose activists rushed to the police station and held a protest there.

Operations police DIG Aamir Zulfikar arrived there and freed the boy on personal guarantee to pacify the protesters. On his orders, a policeman, Sarwar of the Elite Police, was arrested and detained at the police station lock-up on charges of opening the fire that killed the boy. A murder case was also registered against him. The body was sent to the city mortuary for autopsy.

Later, on the orders of city police chief Khwaja Khalid Farooq, an SP visited the deceased’s family. He assured the family of justice and told them that he had been appointed an investigation officer by the police chief with directions to secure maximum punishment for the policeman if proved guilty.

General public has been facing the brunt of the police pickets set up last week in response to the Punjab IGP’s concern over increasing street crime and complaints of non-registration of cases.