LAHORE: Two motorcyclists unleashed acid attack on a 22-year-old woman on Multan Road, police said on Tuesday.
Rescuers said mother-of-two Mehwish was admitted to the Jinnah Hospital. According to hospital sources, 25 per cent of her body was burnt.
Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif took notice and directed the Lahore Capital City Police Officer (CCPO) to arrest the attackers within 24 hours.
Police cited as an eyewitness as saying that the Mandi Stop resident came under the near Ever-New Studio. Rescuers reached the spot after a passerby informed them of the horrific attack. A source in police said the woman was fighting a legal battle battle to bring to book some rapists.
According to police, they have launched investigation. “Investigations are on. Police are collecting information to track down criminals,” a spokesman for the Lahore police said.
Campaigners for acid survivors say at least 150 acid attacks occur in Pakistan each year. “Stop violence against women. We are seriously terrified,” a Punjab university student twitted after the news broke. Though the government had introduced legislations to severely penalize the perpetrators in such incidents yet there is no lull in acid attacks as seen in recent months.
In January, unidentified men intercepted an auto-rickshaw near Akbar Chowk in Green Town and fled after throwing acid on a university teacher.
On December 1, a young woman suffered moderate burns after her husband allegedly threw acid on her following domestic issues near Firdos Market Gulberg. On August 15, at least six persons including three nurses and a woman patient suffered critical to moderate burn injuries when a man threw acid on his nurse wife at Mayo Hospital’s Emergency.
The Nation
