MUZAFFARGARH - A woman was allegedly gang-raped by four persons on the orders of a Punchayat (village council) in Muzaffargarh district in revenge for ‘dishonouring’ their family.
Bachal Mai of Lundi Pitafi village, near Jatoi, was allegedly brutalised because her husband's younger brother Bilal had reportedly developed illicit relations with a girl.
Jatoi DSP Mulazim Hussain said that he has ordered the SHO of Mir Hazar Khan area to take action against the responsible persons. When contacted, SHO Nasrullah Khan held both parties responsible for the happening.
He said Bilal and his brother (husband of Bachal Mai) were earlier taken into custody for sexually assaulting the girl on the complaint of her father Noor Muhammad.
Bachal Mai along with her cousins Munir Hussain and Sabir Hussain told newsmen that heads of Punchayat – Ghulam Mustafa, Hafiz Ataullah Kehaland and Abdul Khaliq – called them for negotiation with aggrieved party on January 28 at 8pm.
Upon this call, Bachal Mai, her mother in-law Anwar Mai and male members of their family – Haji Muhammad Ali, Bilal Ahmed, Khalil Ahmed, Sabir Hussain, Rasul Bakhsh and Akbar Hussain – reached at the residence of Noor Muhammad, father of the girl with whom Bilal was reportedly in a relationship.
The Punchayat leaders asked them to go into Noor’s house but they did not let the males go with them. As they (female members) entered the house, seven persons attacked them. Four of the attackers, Noor Muhammad Jam, Muhammad Hussain, Riaz Ahmed and Fayyaz, overpowered Bachal Mai and took her to a room where they allegedly raped her.
Bachal Mai claimed that the attackers also bit on her breasts. When their relatives listened to the hue and cry, they forced their entry to the home, broke the door of the room to get her freed from the clutches of the assaulters, Bachal Mai said.
During this heads of Punchayat disappeared from the scene. Later the victim along with her family went to Mir Hazar Khan police station and informed SHO Nasrullah Khan and in-charge of Lundi Pitafi police post about the incident. Police told them to visit the police station next morning.
Next day, they said, they reached at the police station but neither did police register a case nor issue a letter for medical examination. Instead, police arrested the complainants Bilal Ahmed and Ghulam Shabbir (sons of Muhammad Ali) and Rasul Bakhsh. Now police was pressurising them for reconciliation with the opponent party, Bachal Mai and her relatives claimed.