Alleged gang-rape: Christian couple given the run-around since August

R was allegedly kept in a police centre for 50 says in revenge for a property dispute.

KARACHI: After a German human rights activist took up the case of the alleged gang-rape of a 32-year-old woman in Karachi by police officers and their accomplices, who illegally detained her for 50 days, the Sindh police has been told to investigate.

A November 18 letter, written by a woman named Eliza Unrat, was addressed to Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani and sent on her behalf by the Pakistan embassy in Germany.

Copies of the letters are available with Express News. In a directive dated December 14, the police have been asked to submit an investigation report into the case within 15 days.

The case is complicated and mired in bureaucratic hang-ups and police inefficiency, says the alleged victim’s family.

Months ago, the alleged victim, R, had filed a lawsuit against police constable Iqbal Masih over a property ownership dispute. On May 31, a stay order was issued in R’s favour. But on the same day she and her family were evicted and an official had “all of our furniture thrown out of our house”, her husband Ejaz told The Express Tribune.

R pursued legal action. On August 10, R was returning home after a court appearance in connection with the lawsuit, when constables Iqbal Masih and Shahid and police informer Shahbaz and his associates kidnapped her, according to an appeal issued by the Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC).

The men allegedly kept her captive in a house in Qayyumabad. The appeal states that the men tried to force her to drop the case against Iqbal Masih. When R refused, she was allegedly gang-raped by constables Shahid and Ishaq and police informers Iqbal, Kamran and Munir.

The family’s suffering continued. R’s husband Ejaz Masih told The Express Tribune that the day after R’s kidnapping, her seven-year-old daughter died after falling into a water tank and drowning.

Ejaz attempted to register a First Information Report (FIR) over his wife’s disappearance. But in what appeared to be a campaign of victimisation at the hands of the police, Ejaz was told he could not register one. On September 19, Ejaz filed an application against the (alleged) kidnapping at the district and sessions court, and on its orders, the Korangi Industrial Area police registered a case of her kidnapping and detention.

That night, after 51 days of being allegedly held captive, R was abandoned within the limits of the Cantt police station.

Ejaz received a call from Jinnah hospital, informing him that his wife was there and had been brought in by some residents. He had her admitted to Civil hospital on the advice of doctors at Jinnah hospital.

On October 1, Ejaz recorded his statement about his wife’s alleged kidnapping and gang-rape. When returning from this, he was arrested by the Mehmoodabad police for what Ejaz claims was a fake robbery case. The AHRC appeal states that he was kept in jail for 15 days and was released on October 19. Ejaz told The Express Tribune that he paid Rs30,000 in bail.

As a result of the original case registered by Ejaz, the Korangi Industrial Area police arrested PCs Ishaq and Shahid, but released them after four days.

Their reasoning was that R had been recovered from an area that was within the limits of the Risala police station, so the case did not fall in their jurisdiction. Ejaz alleges that these three different police stations in Korangi, Mehmoodabad and Risala have been involved in impeding the investigation.

Ejaz Masih told The Express Tribune that “this group — comprising the accused and his accomplices — continue to pressure us to drop the charges. They are well-connected individuals.” The Korangi Industrial Area Special Investigating Officer Sohail Khan told Ejaz to settle the case, but he has refused to do so.

The case was then transferred to Deputy Inspector General (DIG) Ameer Sheikh, who refused to investigate the case because it did not fall under his area’s jurisdiction.

Ejaz Masih says he attempted to register an FIR at the Risala police station. “But when I got there, I was told there was already a complaint against me there in another robbery case - that I had allegedly robbed some woman at gunpoint.”

He claims these are trumped-up charges, instituted against him to deter the couple from pressing charges over R’s (alleged) gang-rape and detention. “Where do we go?” he implores. “They have made a complicated mess. We are trapped everywhere.”

DIG Sheikh told Ejaz to contact the DIG South, who also refused to investigate the case because R Masih’s medico-legal report had not been issued yet.

Ejaz says the FIR he originally registered has been termed a Class-C FIR. “The police have left us with no choice for recourse,” he says. “They keep coming to the house to ‘investigate’, but they do nothing. Our house was also raided by some men on September 10. We keep trying to fight this case … we don’t know what to do. We have also appeared before a judicial magistrate in the Sindh secretariat. In the past seven months, we have spent up to Rs100,000 in this case. We don’t have that many resources.”

“My wife,” Ejaz says, “cannot deal with this anymore. The police ask her all sorts of questions such as ‘If you were gang-raped, why did you not get pregnant?’ How long will she have to deal with this for?”

Published in The Express Tribune, December 19^th, 2010.