[DAWN] Police started the paperwork but haven't done much else on Monday under anti-terrorism act against the people who had vandalized a church in Basti Dhoop Sarri in Sanda and maimed several coppers deployed there to protect it on Sunday night.Police said the case had been registered against 545 people on charges of terrorism and attacking a place of worship. Around 40 suspects have already been nabbed
Please don't kill me!
"Some 500-600 people have been booked under terrorism charges for vandalising the church, damaging public and private property and injuring 10 coppers," Iqbal Town SP (Investigation) Ijaz Shafi Dogar told Dawn.
He said the situation in the area was under control and police were trying to maintain peace.
He said that 45 people were named in the FIR while others remained 'unidentified'. "We are conducting raids for more arrests, especially those who have been named in the FIR," the SP said.
Scores of people had gathered outside the Gulshan-e-Ravi cop shoppe on Sunday night to protest the alleged desecration of the Holy Koran by a Christian youth earlier in the day and demanded that the suspect be handed over to them.They dispersed when police assured them that a case had been registered against the suspect under the blasphemy laws (295-B), but they reassembled in Basti Dhoop Sarri to attack the church and the house of the suspect.
In the meantime, a police party led by DIG (Operations) Haider Ashraf reached the scene and had to use the force when the mob attacked them.
Tensions ran high in the area after Sunday evening's incident.
There is a long history of religion-based trouble in the county and Lahore and its surroundings have been at the centre of some ugly faith-related incidents in the recent past.