Man held for torturing servant on suspicion of theft

Minor was brutally beaten by employer then dumped in PIMS

ISLAMABAD: Police on Saturday arrested a man on charges of “torturing” a minor domestic servant after accusing him of theft and breaking plates.

The 13-year-old servant, identified as Muhammad Ramzan, suffered serious injuries after his employer allegedly beat him up over suspicions of theft.

Ramzan’s brother, Bashir Ahmed, has claimed in a first information report (FIR) that his brother used to work as servant at the residence of a man, Muhammad Arif, in Sector F-10/4.

In the FIR, Ahmed said that his brother was missing for a couple of days and he got a phone call on his brother’s phone from a man, Muhammad Jawad, asking them to come because their brother had stolen something and broken plates.



Ahmed said that when they reached at his residence his brother was not present and they got to know that Ramzan was unconscious in the Pakistan Medical Institute of Sciences (Pims) and battling for his life.

He alleged that Jawad kidnapped his brother and brutally tortured him. In addition, he stated in the FIR that another man, Muhammad Fiaz, handed over his brother to Jawad.

He subsequently registered a case under sections 365 (kidnapping or abducting with intent secretly and wrongfully confining a person), 324 (attempted murder) and 34 (common intention) at the Shalimar Police Station.

The police officials added in the FIR they found the boy unconscious on the floor when they reached the place of incident located in Sector F-10/3. The police said that they rushed the boy to hospital and recorded his statement.

Growing trend

This is not the first such incident in the capital. Recently, couple of other cases involving torture on minor servants surfaced.

Among the cases of child domestic labour and subsequent torture on them the most prominent case that has been brought to light has been of the 10-year-old housemaid who worked at a judge’s residence and was mercilessly tortured allegedly by both the judge and his wife.



Recently, documents had revealed that the Additional District and Sessions Judge Raja Khurram and his wife Maheen Zafar, had been charged for allegedly assaulting, confining, ill-treating, neglecting, abandoning, harming and injuring the minor housemaid.

The couple have pleaded ‘not guilty’ after they were indicted and are currently standing trial. As per the charge sheet filed against them, the suspects are facing a total of six charges.

Following the FIR, the police arrested Jawad and initiated probe into the case.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 18^th, 2017.