Mob strips man, thrashes him over ‘extra-marital affair’

Video circulating on social media highlights sordid offence; police arrest four suspects

HYDERABAD: Suspecting a young man, who is a father of two daughters, of having an extra marital relation with a woman, dozens of residents of a Tharparkar's village stripped the man of his clothes and beat him while filming his public humiliation. While the victim kept silent over the crime, which occurred on Friday in village Kanri, the video shared on the social media ended up highlighting the sordid offence besides drawing attention of the police.

"They kept me hostage for four hours during which I was stripped of clothes, beaten and filmed. They also cut my hair and blackened my face," the victim, Nizamuddin Rahimo, told the media in Hyderabad on Monday. He claimed that he was also made to run for four kilometers. Mithi taluka DSP Haroon Rasheed Sirai recorded the statement of Rahimo in Hyderabad and took the victim to Tharparkar for registration of the FIR.

The DSP said that four suspects identified in the video have been arrested. But he refused to disclose their identities. "Rahimo didn't lodge a complaint with the police. We only came to know about the incident after watching the video on Sunday night," Sirai said. He acknowledged that the public disgrace was a 'big injustice' meted out to Rahimo. "We will lodge an FIR and the police will not take any pressure," he said, when asked about the political connections of the people who assaulted Rahimo .

According to Rahimo, he lives in Hyderabad and went to meet his relatives in Tharparkar. He denied that the woman with whom he had allegedly been talking over phone for some time was also beaten. "There were around 200 people in the autak [guest house]. I was alone. They asked me to give a certain statement but I refused."

Published in The Express Tribune, June 18^th, 2019.