Panchayat issues ‘shoot at sight’ orders against court-marriage couple

Orders are issued against a couple after they are declared ‘kala kali’.

RAJANPUR/ MULTAN: A panchayat in Rajanpur district’s Muhammadpur area has issued shoot at sight orders against a couple after declaring them ‘kala kali’.

The couple, Asya and Dilshad, taking refuge in Kot Chatha area in Multan district, told The Express Tribune that they had run away to protect their lives. They alleged that Asya’s family wanted to kill them.

They said that they were cousins and had been engaged since childhood. They said that after the death of Asya’s father, her brothers, Sabir Hussain and Mureed Hussain, refused to ‘acknowledge the engagement and marry her off to Dilshad’. The couple got married at a local court and fled to Karachi.

According to the station house officer at Muhammadpur police station, Malik Talib Babar, the Hussain brothers registered a kidnapping case against Dilshad after the couple had escaped to Karachi.  Babar said that the case was withdrawn after two weeks. “The complainants said that they had settled the issue and did not need to pursue the case,” the SHO said.

The couple said that they were called back by the family on the assurance that they would not be harmed and that the family wanted to settle the issue. They said that on their arrival, a panchayat comprising 60 people, headed by Faiz Muhammad Korai, the former nazim’s brother and an influential landlord, decided that Dilshad would surrender his land to Asya’s brothers. The panchayat also imposed a fine of Rs150,000 on Dilshad. It further decided that Asya should be sent to a neutral person’s house where she can be asked if she married Dilshad at will or was forced by him.

Asya said that she was sent to the house of Khan Muhammad Baranda, a Wadera, where her brothers and mother coerced her to dissolve the marriage. She said that they threatened to kill her if she refused to give in to their directives. She said that at night she escaped and contacted Dilshad. The couple fled the village and are now staying in Kot Chatha.

Following their escape, the panchayat declared them kala kali and issued the shoot at sight directives.

Korai, who headed the panchayat, was not available for comment.

The SHO further said that some 20 days ago Asya’s family once again approached him and lodged a complaint against Dilshad’s father for beating them up. Dilshad’s father, however, told The Express Tribune that he tried to visit his house, which he alleged has been demolished by Asya’s brothers, and was threatened by them to stay away from the area. The SHO said that the house was damaged during the floods and could not have been demolished by Asya’s family.

Dilshad said that he had approached the chief minister’s secretariat and lodged a complaint against Asya’s brothers. Muhammadpur SHO admitted that he received the copy of the report from the chief minister’s secretariat.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 22^nd, 2010.