Too late: Woman regrets killing husband

Boyfriend who confessed to abetting the murder was given benefit of doubt.

GILGIT:

A woman, convicted of killing her husband last year, who is now in prison, regrets that her decision not only ruined her own life, but also that of her three children.

A local court in Gilgit sentenced her to 10 years’ imprisonment in late 2011, while her boyfriend walked out scot-free after he was given benefit of the doubt, despite the fact that he had confessed to the crime during the investigation.

“I wish it hadn’t happened,” Naheed Akhtar tells inmates at district jail, Gilgit. Officials who have access to her inside the jail say she is dying a little every day.

For the children, life has little to offer, as their mother is behind bars for murdering their father and they are at the mercy of relatives.

Akhtar’s story came into the limelight last summer after her husband, Mukhtar Hussain went missing from Gilgit in July.

When the police launched an investigation, they discovered that Akhtar had killed her husband in connivance with her boyfriend.

Both Akhtar and her boyfriend confessed to plotting the murder and killing the husband during the investigation, said Hafizur Rehman, the investigation officer.

The day they killed him, the husband had reportedly beaten her. The man’s bullet-riddled body was recovered from the riverside. The case was solved by tracing their mobile phone calls, he added.

Sharing details of the case, he said that Akhtar and her husband had married for love nearly seven years ago. But their love began to fade after the birth of three kids as they were besieged by financial problems. They frequently quarrelled at home because of the financial crunch.

Meanwhile, the woman developed illicit relations with a childhood friend, Jahanzeb, with whom she shared her marital problems. When relations soured between the husband and wife, Akhtar decided to kill him.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 15^th, 2012.