PHOTO: FANPAGE
The killer, named Waseem, was later arrested from Dera Ghazi Khan and confessed to killing his sister for ‘bringing dishonour to the family’ through her controversial videos shared online.
Evidence suggests the brothers of Qandeel conspired to kill the internet star. She had six brothers and two sisters.
Qandeel, 26, stirred a controversy in March when she promised to strip dance if Pakistan beat India at the T20 World Cup 2016. She soon became a household name after posting pictures and videos considered too bold and raunchy by the mainstream.
But her recent pictures alongside a cleric caused uproar, with the young starlet forced into hiding after receiving death threats from several quarters.
Qandeel’s family told police the model-cum-singer had silently moved from Karachi to a rented house with her parents in Muzaffarabad Colony on the outskirts of Multan after Eidul Fitr. She also had frequent quarrels with his brothers over the sharing of her videos.
The parents initially reported her death as a suicide to Rescue 1122 at about 10:30am Saturday. When the police arrived with the rescuers, it was disclosed the victim was Qandeel.
Multan CPO DIG Azhar Akram stopped the rescuers from moving the body to a morgue and instead took the deceased to hospital, where it was found she had been strangled to death.
Qandeel’s father Azeem told police the suspected killer had come to their home last night from Dera Ghazi Khan, possibly after her elder brother Aslam Shaheen informed him about the celebrity’s location.
Aslam, a junior-ranked army officer, had called for killing Qandeel many times in the past for bringing dishonour to the family with her controversial videos.
“Waseem was sleeping on the roof of the house with us while Qandeel was in her bedroom when I last saw them,” Azeem told The Express Tribune.
Waseem left the house in the morning without informing his parents, who found their daughter dead hours later. The killer also took away the purse and cellphone of Qandeel.
The body was shifted to Nishtar Hospital for an autopsy. Doctors said the victim was asphyxiated first with a pillow and then strangulated. Qandeel was killed about 12 hours earlier and there were nail scratches on her neck and face, the post-mortem concluded.
Case registered
Police have spread the scope of investigation to all those people accused by the late starlet for threatening her with dire consequences, including her brothers, her ex-husbands and cleric Mufti Abdul Qavi. Muzaffarabad police lodged an FIR against Waseem and Aslam under sections 302 and 109 of the Pakistan Penal Code on the complaint of Qandeel’s father. Qavi, a former member of the Ruet-e-Hilal Committee, was also nominated in the FIR.
At a news conference later, police announced Waseem’s arrest from Dera Ghazi Khan.
Responding to reporters’ questions, the killer admitted he murdered his sister for posting controversial pictures and videos on Facebook. “She was bringing disrepute to our family’s honour and I could not tolerate it any further. I killed her around 11.30pm Friday night when everyone else had gone to bed. My brother is not involved in the murder,” he said before he was taken away by the police.
Strong reaction
Qandeel’s murder sparked angry reactions from politicians and celebrities, who have been becoming increasingly vocal about honour killings in Pakistan recently.
PPP Chairman Bilawal Bhutto condemned Qandeel’s murder, calling upon Punjab government to arrest the murderers immediately.
“Qandeel was a Pakistani woman and deserved the right to life. No ifs, no buts. Punjab government must hold the murderer accountable,” he wrote on Twitter.
Filmmaker Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy, whose documentary on honour killings won an Oscar this year, told AFP the murder would make women feel less safe.
“I really feel that no woman is safe in this country, until we start making examples of people, until we start sending men who kill women to jail, unless we literally say there will be no more killing and those who dare will spend the rest of their lives behind bars,” she said.
Published in The Express Tribune, July 17th, 2016.
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