Shop owner allegedly abducted, extorted by cops

Police officers have been accused of abducting and extorting money from a mobile shop owner.

According to the police report, Mohammad Waseem Sarwar, the owner of Smart Phones shop in Kacheri Bazaar, was driving home on April 5th when he was stopped by two armed constables who pulled him out of his car and put him in a white GLI car parked on Jail Road.

The car was driven by other policemen who took him to Chowki Sidhupura where he was locked in a storage room and searched. The police officers forcibly took Rs275,000 from Sarwar, accusing him of buying stolen mobile phones. They demanded an additional Rs. 150,000 to release him and threatened to include his name in criminal cases if he did not comply.

Sarwar was held captive for several hours and managed to contact his acquaintances Tayyab Arif and Iqbal at 1 am, who helped him settle the matter with the police for Rs. 100,000. After withdrawing the money from an ATM machine, they handed it over to the accused police officers, who then released Sarwar.

After the allegations were proved in the investigation of the matter, a case has been registered against the accused police officers on the order of senior police officers.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 12^th, 2023.