Four cops suspended for torturing students, demanding bribe

The two young men were arrested after they had a brief altercation with staff at a petrol pump

KARACHI: Four police personnel were suspended from duty for allegedly torturing two young men while they were being held at the Sacchal Police Station on Thursday. The two victims, identified as Bakhtullah and Tariq, were arrested by the police after they had a minor altercation at a petrol pump within the jurisdiction of Sacchal Police Station late on Wednesday night.

A case against the two men, both of whom are university students, was registered on the complaint of the petrol pump owner and they were detained at the police station overnight.

On Thursday afternoon, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf leader and MNA Saifur Rehman, flanked by the families of the accused men, reached the police station to get details of the case and meet the men. He was, however, denied entry into the police station and the police personnel also misbehaved with him. After some time, MNA Rehman did manage to enter the police station where he found one of the students in the police station lockup, while the other was being held in a back room. The police personnel refused to open the door to the backroom and kept shoving and pushing MNA Rehman, shouting at him to leave.

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Speaking to media personnel outside the police station, MNA Rehman said that the student locked in the back room had been stripped naked and was being tortured. He added that the police personnel had demanded Rs500,000 from the accused's family as bribe and threatened to film him and post it on social media if they didn't pay the money.

MNA Rehman said that he had informed East Zone DIG Amir Farooqi about the incident and that the latter had immediately ordered the suspension of the police personnel involved in the incident, besides initiating a departmental inquiry against them.

The suspended police officials include investigation officers, Ahmed Shah and Darya Khan, besides two others whose identities could not be ascertained till the filing of this report.

Meanwhile, MNA Rehman said that the accused's family had reached a settlement with the petrol pump owner who had registered a case against the arrested students and he had agreed to withdraw the case.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 25^th, 2019.