Alleged arrests: Hotel owner claims that police holding son and nephew

Rent agreement turns sour.

SUKKUR:

A hotel owner, and his family, took to the streets in protest against the SITE police on alleged charges of arresting his son and nephew, and keeping them at an undisclosed location. The protest was held in front of the National Press Club in Sukkur on Thursday.

Abdul Rehman Qureshi, the father of the kidnapped boy, told The Express Tribune that he has been running a hotel, in the wholesale fruit and vegetable market of Sukkur, for the last twenty years. A shop adjacent to his hotel, belonging to Syed Ashfaq Shah, was vacant.

Upon Rehman Qureshi’s request, Ashfaq Shah rented the shop to him for Rs18,000 a month. Rehman Qureshi said that he spent more than Rs500,000 on repairing and renovating the shop. The owner of the shop had consented to pay back this amount whenever the shop was handed back to him. Recently, the owner asked Rehman Qureshi to vacate the shop, even though the rent agreement was for three years and only ten months had passed.

Rehman Qureshi had refused to vacate the shop. Upon this refusal, the owner of the shop along with some armed men raided his hotel and took away his son, Jawedur Rehman, and nephew, Mohammad Yamin. “After a couple of hours the SITE police station’s SHO, Syed Mansab Shah, called me and said that my son and nephew were with the police. When I inquired why they have been arrested, he asked me to hand over the shop to Ashfaq Shah in exchange for their release,” said Rehman Qureshi.

Mansab Shah told The Express Tribune that he know nothing about the boys. He said that Ashfaq Shah and Abdul Rehman had both come to the police station to resolve their dispute.

Mansab Shah said that the shop owner had informed the police that Rehman Qureshi has broken the rent agreement by subletting the shop to another party on the monthly rent of Rs40,000 and therefore he was asked to vacate the shop. “Rehman Qureshi’s claim about the arrest of the boys is false and he is doing this drama to pressurize the police,” said Mansab Shah.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 22^nd,  2011.