Gang rape: Pregnant woman comes forward alleging she was raped by her employer

Eight months pregnant woman comes forward; accuses a local landlord and his friends of having raped her.

LODHRAN:

An eight months pregnant woman came forward a week ago and accused a local landlord and his friends of having raped her but police officials refused to pursue a case against the accused.

Chak 315, Duniapur resident Mohammad Kamran said that his daughter had been gang raped several months ago but that the family had kept quiet because their lives had been threatened.

“We thought we could bear it but now that her pregnancy has progressed and people have begun taunting us we cannot take it anymore,” Kamran told reporters.

Kamran said that landlord Sultan had hired him to tend to his fields over six years ago. He said that he had borrowed a sum of money from Sultan years ago and that he and his daughter were paying off his debt by working for free. “She agreed to help me by working in their house as a housemaid,” he said.

Kamran’s 20-year-old daughter Kishwar said that she had been locked in a room by Sultan, his son and four other men eight months ago and raped repeatedly. “I didn’t tell my family at first but they eventually found out when my pregnancy began to show,” she said.

The girl said that she and her family decided to keep the matter secret because they had been issued death threats by Sultan and his family.

However, when the entire village discovered the pregnancy Kamran approached the police. “They ignored me at first but later they registered a case,” he said, adding that the police didn’t pursue any investigation. “My daughters attackers roam the streets openly and they taunt us openly too. Everyone in the village knows what they did,” he said.

Kishwar said that Chaudhry Muhammad Sultan, his son Sajjad, Ghulam Abbas and three other men had locked her up in a room and raped her.

“They told me that this was how I could pay off my father’s debts,” she said. She told reporters that she had decided not to tell her family at first but when she got pregnant the matter became unavoidable.

Police officials have registered a case, 178/11 but Duniyapur inspector Khuda Bukhsh said that there wasn’t enough evidence to go on. “They didn’t come to us after the incident happened and now there is no evidence but their testimony,” he said. A DHQ doctor said that Kishwar’s medical test was inconclusive but her body did bear signs of abuse. “Most of the scars and wounds have healed but she was definitely tortured and severely beaten,” Dr Arif said.

Chaudhry Muhammad Sutlan said that the story was a conspiracy to undermine him and that he had been nothing but kind to Kamran and his family. “I gave the man a loan when he needed to build his house and he was working it off,” he said. “The girl had an affair and got pregnant and she is blaming my family,” he said.



*All names in the story have been changed to protect the identity of the victim

Published in The Express Tribune, April 11^th,  2011.