Indictment in Mazar rape case deferred
KARACHI, July 30: The additional district and sessions judge-IV, east, Aftab Ahmed Bughio, deferred the indictment of suspects in a gang-rape case till Aug 2 due to the lawyers’ strike on Wednesday.
Investigation officer Sabir Hussain, earlier, submitted the police file of the case in court. The IO had been issued several show-cause notices by the court with a direction to submit the police file.
The case pertained to the gang-rape of an 18-year-old woman on the premises of Mazar-i-Quaid. The woman was subjected to sexual assault after being kidnapped by five men on the night of March 15 and was found in an unstable condition outside the mausoleum on March 17.
An FIR (No 50/2008) of the case was registered at Brigade police station under Section 365/B of the Pakistan Penal Code (the section was inserted through the Protection of Women Act 2006) on the complaint of her father.
On March 20, the police had arrested an assistant manager security of mausoleum for his alleged involvement in the case. An accountant and a personal assistant to the resident engineer of the Quaid-i-Azam Management Mausoleum Board were booked on April 24 following the receipt of the DNA report that confirmed their involvement in the case. All the suspects were remanded in jail custody.
In the charge-sheet, the investigation officer stated that the 18-year-old woman from Lodhran, accompanied by her relatives, came to Karachi on March 15. They paid a visit to the mausoleum of Quaid-i-Azam at night. The couple went inside earlier than the rest of the family members. However, the moment her husband left to bring in the remaining family members, who were waiting outside in a bus, a power breakdown occurred and the woman was kidnapped by the assistant security manager of the Mazar and his associates. She was taken to a room where she was forced to drink wine and sexually assaulted. She was later found in an unstable condition outside the mausoleum.
Source: Dawn
Date:7/31/2008
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