Abduction and death of newborn baby after his kidnapping from Pims has become entangled between two police stations, with investigation being put on hold, at least for the time being. PHOTO: FILE
The abduction and death of a newborn baby after his kidnapping from the Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (Pims) has become entangled between two police stations, with the investigation being put on hold, at least for the time being.
Saifur Rehman, the father of the one day-old boy, lodged a first information report (FIR) of the kidnapping case against unknown persons with the Margalla Police Station Islamabad on October 31.
Later, the body of the newborn was recovered from a stream in the Naseerabad police’s jurisdiction in Rawalpindi.
Investigating officers (IOs) at both the police stations put the blame at each other for failure to make any headway into the case.
The IO at Naseerabad Police Station, Mohammad Riaz, claimed that the case had been transferred to the Margalla police and now they should be asked for updates. However, the IO at the Margalla Police Station Ghulam Habib had another story to tell. “We are still waiting for the Naseerabad police to legally handover the case to us so that further investigation can be carried out,” he claimed.
Habib said that the body was found from Rawalpindi and the case automatically fell within their jurisdiction, adding that the Naseerabad police also had possession of the postmortem report but had not turned it over yet.
Habib, on the other hand, claimed that the parents of the baby were not cooperating with the police.
“We have asked them to come to Islamabad for a DNA test and to identify the suspected woman whose sketches have been prepared, but they are not showing any interest in pursuing the case,” he said.
When contacted, Saifur Rehman said “We are unable to understand why the police want DNA tests as they have already handed over the body to us and we have buried it.”
“I cannot afford to pay even a single penny for a medical test, and, my wife had a C-section. She is not in any condition to travel to Islamabad from Lora, Abbottabad,” he said.
While talking about the sketches, Rehman said that the police were already in contact with one of his female relatives who had seen the unknown woman who had allegedly abducted the newborn.
Rehman said that his family was considering filing a case against the Pims administration for their negligence.
Meanwhile, Pims Spokesperson Dr Ayesha Eshani said that the hospital administration was making “all-out efforts” to enhance security at the hospital by installing CCTV cameras. At the same time, she talked about a shortage of funds.
She said that the hospital has recently received four to six CCTV cameras from donors and was waiting to install them at sensitive sites including the emergency ward.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 24th, 2013.
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