Punjab Caretaker Chief Minister Mohsin Naqvi has described the death of PTI worker Ahmed Bilal as an “accident” and accused the PTI of making “false allegations” of murder. A claim that the former ruling party has denied.

“It was shocking for us when we got to know about the death of the PTI worker. The police were trying to ensure the implementation of the law but the death of a worker is not something to ignore. There were no instructions and no such thing that workers should be tortured so much,” he said at a press conference on Saturday. He was accompanied by Punjab Inspector General of Police Dr Usman Anwar.

A PTI worker died while several others were seriously injured on Wednesday when the Punjab government used force to block a PTI rally—which the party had called as part of their election campaign.

The former ruling party had alleged that the worker was killed in the police crackdown.

PTI worker Bilal was not killed in a police crackdown, the interim chief minister of Punjab said, adding that the police and government “immediately” started working when they received the information. He claimed that the deceased person did not die because of torture.

Vehicle that dropped Bilal Ahmed body at hospital

Punjab IGP Dr Usman Anwar started speaking by mentioning a video in which the father of the deceased, Liaquat Ali, who in a video message urged the police to conduct an investigation and provide justice to him.

“We started this investigation three days ago. The body of this innocent person was dropped off by a black Vigo at 6:52pm at the Services Hospital. We received this information and immediately we tried to track it,” he said.

It was decided that no information out of this will be shared with the media until it was “fully seen, available, and confirmed,” he said, adding that all the “technical things” were available

“We immediately issued a letter with eight TORs that included the cause of the person’s death and it was decided that if this person was killed in the police crackdown and if it was found that police’s torture was the cause then strict action would be taken against them and legal action will be completed,” he said.

The vehicle that dropped the body was identified “with the help of 31 cameras” and it was recovered from the basement of the GPC security. The IGP showed videos and pictures to substantiate his claims.

“The car was recovered from the basement of Waris Shah of the GB security and Gulbahar security,” he said and claimed that drops of the blood of the deceased were present in the back seat of the vehicle. The police have conducted the forensics of the sample.

“The car when hits the CMH on the four-way bridge at 6:24pm, they immediately take him to the car,” Anwar said and added that the people were not criminals and had no plans to kill Bilal Ahmed aka Zile Shah.

The incident was followed by “misbehaviour” on social media at 7:13pm and continued till last night, he claimed and vowed to present all pieces of evidence to the father of the deceased PTI worker.

Anwar said that the vehicle left the spot at 6:24pm and arrived in front of the CM House at 6:31pm, however, unfortunately, that gate is always closed for security. They tried to save his life, they are not criminals, he reiterated while speaking about the driver and people inside the vehicle.

“They said that they turned back and crosses all check posts and reached the services hospital at 6:52pm. There they handed over the body to Edhi’s ambulance that was leaving the hospital. The driver’s name is Jahanzeb, Umar Fareed was sitting with him,” the IGP said, adding that the accident took place when the car hits a divider.

All the people would be brought in front of the court, Anwar added.

The owner, Raja Shakeel, of the car, had no intention to kill the person as such but he is the PTI central Punjab Vice President).

He slammed the social media campaigns against the Punjab police and CM. “I want to clearly say this that this conspiracy has failed because our technical teams have worked on it and found all the pieces of evidence and found those telephones that when they spoke to the PTI leader.”

He added that the legal process would be completed.

Yasmin Rashid and Raja Shakeel

The interim Punjab chief minister claimed that Raja Shakeel had given all the information to PTI leader Yasmin Rashid at 8:30pm as to “how the accident happened” by them.

“Yasmin Rashid told him that to come to Zaman Park the next day on March 9. I will take you there and let you meet with other leaders,” he said while quoting Yasmin.

The next day, the caretaker CM said that they arrived at Zaman Park and informed the leadership about the whole incident. She told Shakeel there was nothing needed.

“I have told you everything about your meeting, you should go,” the interim CM quoted Yasmin as saying. He claimed that after the meeting the owner went “underground” and the driver changed his attire. He claimed that this information was given to Zubair Niazi.

Interim CM Naqvi said that it was not easy to make allegations while reacting to the social media campaign against them. He claimed that he would have answered differently if he was not at the seat of the chief minister.

“If you think that if I will get under pressure, I won’t. If there was someone else I don’t know about that, but I will not bow to pressure like this. You are welcome if you find anything wrong but not with threats, abuse and tweet. I am not going to surrender at any cost, it would be better if I go home. But not like this,” he said.

The police claimed that action would be taken as per law.

The interim CM said that they had no plans to arrest the PTI workers as they were in large numbers. “We wanted to arrest and free them in a far area,” he said.

“There is a blunt injury in the police report,” the IGP said, adding that all the medical report shows blunt trauma and it could not say that it was an accident or police torture.

The state would come into action when you would abuse state agencies, the IGP added.

“Yasmin Rashid knew about the accident despite that she told this Imran Khan, after that both of them did a press conference, and both of them made accusations against us. I appeal to Imran to extract lie element from his politics,” the caretaker CM said and claimed Yasmin did wrong.

“If they did not know it was something else, but they did it despite knowing it.”

‘Brazen lying lot’

The PTI slammed the Punjab government for making accusations against the PTI.

“You brazen lying lot! As a doctor, I can confirm the torture on Ali Bilal. Even if there is a possibility of other injuries being an accident, the ones on his private part could not have been so. These were INFLICTED! We all saw him being dragged and alive & well in the prison van,” PTI leader Yasmin Rashid said in a tweet.

She told Bol News that the interim Punjab government should be ashamed of itself. She claimed the caretaker setup dragged the deceased PTI worker and assaulted on him.

Rashid added that the torture of private parts could not occur in accidents. She claimed that she was being beaten by police when the incident took place.

PTI leader Hammad Azhar slammed the caretaker CM for telling lies.

In a tweet, PTI leader Shireen Mazari reminded the caretaker setup that their job was to hold elections within 90 days of the dissolution of assemblies.

“Remember! The nation will take full account of every incident of mischief/constitutional violation, including the murder of the innocent Zile Shah!” she said.