Rape victim brings police to dock | Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF)

Pakistan Press Foundation

Rape victim brings police to dock

BAHAWALPUR, July 14 2006: An alleged gang-rape victim from a Liaquatpur village has charged the Rahim Yar Khan district police officer with pressuring her to accept the verdict of a panchayat (local jury) and compromise with the influential accused. An abduction case has been registered against her, though she claims that she was gang-raped for 33 days. Appearing before the press in the company of her brother Altaf Husain and son Imam Baksh, the 40-something woman –- the mother of six — narrated her ordeal saying that on May 21, Larr clan elders, including Jam Abdullah, came to their Basti Khokhran and started firing.

She said they harassed young girls, took away cash and jewellery and abducted her to exact revenge of disappearance of their relative Ms Azra. The suspects, she said, took her to various places. Then her son complained to the DIG under whose order the police registered a case of abduction on May 29 against 20 nominated and 250 other assailants. She said after 33 days, former UC nazim Jam Abdul Aziz took her at the outhouse of another landlord, Sardar Nabi Bakhsh and asked her to accept the decision of the village jury and get Rs250,000 as a reward for compromise.

Later, she alleged, the Rahim Yar Khan police DPO summoned her and forced her to accept the verdict, claiming that he was unable to take action against the influential people. She demanded that the police higher-ups should register a rape case and arrest all the suspects.
Source: Dawn
Date:7/14/2006