Meanwhile, one protester was wounded when a cinema guard opened fire as angry crowds armed with clubs and bamboo poles converged on the Firdaus picture house, smashing it up and setting furniture ablaze, police officer Gohar Ali told AFP.

Witnesses said a rampaging crowd stormed the Shama cinema, smashing windows and setting it on fire.

When the protestors reached Arbab Road in the provincial capital, they attacked Capital cinema. The mobs broke down the cinema’s main gate and set fire to its screen.