12 Empress Market shops robbed

Twelve shops inside Empress Market in Saddar were robbed in the wee hours of Monday and police have detained two watchmen over suspicion.

Preedy SHO Aurangzeb Khattak said the police were informed in the morning about the robbery. He reached the scene with his staff and found that the front locks were unbroken. Later, he went to the inner side of the market where the dry fruit and spices shops are located.

The SHO said it was surprising to see that the grill of the market was intact and the locks were unbroken. He told his team to detain the two watchmen of the market. Later, they went inside the market where he found the locks of 12 shops broken. The officer said the shops belonged to dry fruit and spices traders.

He added that the robbers had taken away around Rs100,000 from the shops.

The two watchmen, Abdul Rahim and Usman Ghani, have been detained over suspicion that they might have assisted the robbers. The officer said the robbers could have been four or five in number and they had entered the market without breaking the grill or locks. A case was registered and further investigation is under way.

On September 24, 15 shops were robbed at Urdu Bazaar on MA Jinnah Road in the wee hours of the day.

Thieves had broken into the shops and made off with millions of rupees.

Police had booked a security guard. Earlier on September 9, 22 shops were robbed at Tibet Centre, that too in the wee hours of the day.

The robbers had overpowered the watchman and used cutters to break the locks of the shops.

They had taken away around Rs600,000.  The police had later arrested four Afghan nationals in connection with the case.

Tibet Centre is also the location of another robbery a few months ago when five shops were looted.

After the first robbery, plans were discussed to install CCTV cameras inside and around Tibet Centre during a meeting between police officials and market traders, however, no steps were taken to materialise the plan. 

The SHO said the market traders had assured the police that they would install CCTV cameras but had not done so yet.

In the Muharram of 2015, at least 24 shops situated in Madina Medicine market were robbed during the Ashura holidays.

 The market situated near Denso Hall had been closed as part of security measures for mourning processions which passed by it on their way to the Hussainian Iranian Imambargah in Kharadar.

According to the police, the shop owners arrived after the three-day holiday and found the locks broken and large caches of expensive medicine missing. Any cash kept in the shops was also gone.