KATHMANDU, July 13 (Reuters) - Four senior police officers have been taken hostage by their subordinates at a police base in southwest Nepal because the junior officers say they are ill-treated and given poor quality food, an official said on Sunday.

About 200 policemen at a riot police camp in Nepalgunj, a large town 320 km (200 miles) from Kathmandu, took the officers hostage in a protest move on Saturday, said Modraj Dotel, a home ministry spokesman.

Local media reports said seven officers were taken captive.

Television clips showed dozens of policemen in camouflage, some holding arms, standing guard at the iron gates of the camp.

Other police have cordoned off the area, officials said.

Residents said they heard the sound of gun shots on Saturday but Dotel said no one was wounded.

"The government has already instructed the police chief to do whatever is required to maintain discipline in the force and deal with the situation," Dotel said.

The incident is the latest in a series of revolts by junior policemen against what they call low-quality food and ill-treatment by senior ranks.

"These incidents are the results of the long and chaotic political transition," said Narayan Wagle, editor of the Nepali daily, Kantipur.

Nepal is emerging from a decade-long civil war and years of political turmoil. Nepalis voted in historic elections for a constituent assembly in April in which the Maoist former rebels emerged as the biggest political party. (Reporting by Gopal Sharma; Editing by Jonathan Allen and Matthew Jones) (For the latest Reuters news on Nepal see: http://in.reuters.com, for blogs see http://blogs.reuters.com/in/)

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