Rawalpindi - Aerial firing near a school bus at Committee Chowk created panic among the law-enforcement agencies yesterday.
The police bigwigs rushed to the scene and cordoned off the area.
According to a police official, the management of a private school located on Chakri Road took the faculty members including female teachers to Chattar Park for picnic at a hired bus. He said that the picnickers were returning back when a verbal clash occurred between the bus driver and driver of a private car over some traffic issue at Committee Chowk. As a result, one of the car riders took out his pistol, shot a bullet into the air and ran away. The bus driver Jameel immediately called Police Emergency Service 15 and lodged a complaint that unknown armed men opened firing at the school bus, he said. He added that a wireless call by Rescue 15 staff about attack on school bus swelled a wave of panic among the law-enforcement agencies and the officials rushed to the crime scene. Later, the incident was mentioned in the daily crime register, the police official said.
Talking to media men, SSP (Operations) Karamat Ullah Malik said that police are making efforts to trace the car riders who had quarrelled with the bus driver and resorted to aerial firing.
Educational institutes in Pakistan have been on high alert since the Bacha Khan University attack on January 20. The attack in the university at Charsadda, which killed 21 people, was the second high profile terror attack on a Pakistani educational institute. In December 2014, 132 students were killed when the Army Public School, Peshawar was targeted.
Earlier on February 10, the misinformation about entry of armed terrorists in Government Postgraduate Viqar-un-Nisa College for Women caused stampede and as a result 13 students got injured and three others fainted.
Following the misinformation provided by a security guard, other guards of the college buzzed emergency alarm and the students who were attending their classes at that time started running towards exit gate located near hockey ground. The administration of Viqar-un-Nisa Noon School, an adjacent institution, also vacated the school following news of terrorist attack on the college.
The misinformation put the entire city and adjoining Islamabad into a state of fear as several other educational institutions are either closed or security has been beefed up there to avoid any possible terror attack.