KARACHI: One more person, who was injured in Karachi’s Sher Shah area blast a few days ago, died on Wednesday.

With the death of Jamil Ahmad, a resident of Rajanpur, Punjab, the death toll from the blast has now reached 18. The body of the deceased has been taken to his native town for burial. A powerful gas explosion had ripped through the building of a private bank situated on a nullah in Sher Shah Paracha Chowk in the SITE area of Karachi on Saturday (December 18, 2021). Moments later, another blast occurred in a gas pipeline at the same place injuring a rescue official.

The Karachi police spokesperson said that according to the preliminary report, it seemed that the explosion was caused by gas accumulated in the nullah on which the bank was built. Police in Karachi have said that a ‘dacoit’ was killed while one of the policemen was injured in an ‘encounter’ in Model Colony area of the city. According to the police, after receiving information that some ‘dacoits’ had forced their way into a house in the Colony, a team was sent to catch them.

The Force has further said the moment police personnel arrived at the scene, dacoits opened fire at them, forcing the former to retaliate. Hence, an exchange of fire ensued between both the sides which resulted in the killing of one of the dacoits and an injury to a cop, police said, and also claimed to have recovered Rs0.3 million from the dacoits in cash, jewellery and a pistol.