Overseas Pakistani beaten over rent dispute in Lahore

Police claimed they invited the complainant to join the investigations but he refused to cooperate

LAHORE: An overseas Pakistani was beaten and tortured in Sundar police limits by an influential political figure over a dispute on restaurant rent.

The victim, identified as Syed Muhammad Anwar Ali, 67, registered an FIR with Sundar police station. He said he had been living in Norway for the last 45 years.

After returning to Pakistan, he borrowed a house in Bahria Town and took a restaurant on rent in the market of Malik Riaz, an activist of Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz (PML-N) in Lahore. He spent Rs10 million in setting up the restaurant and has been paying a rent of Rs100,000 monthly for the last three years, even though the eatery was running a loss.

He informed Malik Riaz about the financial losses time and again. For the last one year, he had also been telling Riaz that he wanted to rent the restaurant to a third party and he had given the consent. On October 1, Riaz invited him to his house. He, along with Malik Gohar and Muhammad Asif, went there and found Riaz sitting with his gunmen. When he starting telling him about the whole matter, Riaz got infuriated and asked his gunmen to teach him (Anwar) a lesson. “Teach him a lesson over the loss of the last three years,” Riaz told the gunmen, the victim narrated to the police in his FIR. However, the gunmen were reluctant to follow his orders. Subsequently, Riaz took the weapon himself and beat the victim with clubs, fists and the butt of the gun. When his friends came to save him, the bodyguards of Riaz followed and assaulted him outside the house. As per the victim’s statement, Riaz directed his accomplices to shut down the restaurant. Six gunmen came to the restaurant, assaulted the employees and snatched valuables and documents. Anwar demanded justice in his complaint.

The victim said he returned to Pakistan due to an inherent love for his home country and he had invested in the hope for a brighter future. However, he and his family were gravely perturbed after the incident.

Speaking about the issue, Sundar police station investigations in charge told The Express Tribune that the force had raided the house of Malik Riaz on the night of the incident, but could not find him. He added that the suspect had secured pre-arrest bail from the court. On the other hand, the police had been repeatedly invited the complainant to join investigations. However, he refused to cooperate with police, saying the Norwegian embassy would now deal with the matter.