Missing cell phones, records could be key to Bawany family murders

One victim had been receiving prank calls for months.

KARACHI:

Four missing cell phones from the house of the murdered Bawany family in Askari III could be a valuable clue, said the police on Saturday as no other valuables were taken.

The police has asked the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to help them retrieve the record of calls and short message service (SMS) made from them.

“We don’t know for sure why the phones are missing,” said DIG Shaukat Sheikh. “It would be really hard to say anything at this point.”

Five bodies, a 13-year-old girl among them, were found in the house on Wednesday. The victims included Arif Bawany, his wife Zainab Bawany, son Zubair, daughter-in-law Aliya and granddaughter Rida. Everyone was stabbed in the chest.

While the police continue to search for clues, Aliya’s friends claim that she was receiving prank calls for six months. She was a teacher at the Links School.

“One day Aliya literally started swearing on the phone at this person who was bothering her again and again,” said a person who knew Aliya. “Someone had been bothering her for months.” The police have not yet contacted any of the couple’s friends for questioning.

They are waiting for a vital chemical examination report will tell if the family was poisoned. Investigators have tried to recreate the murder scene. The bodies of the four adults were found from the same room. “First Arif and his wife were killed. They were old and couldn’t put up a resistance. We didn’t see any signs which would suggest that they were dragged from some other part of the house,” said DIG Sheikh.

Then they went for the daughter-in-law, he said. “She was a woman and obviously couldn’t put up much of a fight. It is hard to say why they killed the little girl on the upper floor.”

But DIG Sheikh said Zubair might have entered the home sometime after the others were killed. “He was wearing shoes, socks and was properly dressed when his body was found. He had just come in.”

Details are slowly emerging from family and friends and other people who knew them.

Unlike what the people in neighbourhood thought, the family had some problems. SSP Clifton Tariq Dharejo quoted family members as saying that Zubair did not have a job.

Sources in a call centre said that he was thrown out of the training programme just a day before the murders. “The people around him were very uncomfortable,” said an employee who knew him. “His English was good and that is why he was chosen for a new campaign.”

The company has declined to comment.

Family friends are also perplexed. “This was a well known family, very nice people. But close relatives are hesitant. They are not speaking to others in the Memon community,” said a family friend.

The family driver and cook are in police custody.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 4^th, 2012.