Four men held for killing young woman, relative for ‘honour’

HYDERABAD: A man and his three close relatives were apprehended for allegedly killing his young recently-wed wife and her friend upon seeing the victims in an objectionable position in a house at a brick kiln near Tando Hyder in the early hours of Saturday.

SHO of the Pabban police station said that the axe used in the killing of Ghulam Shabbir Khoso, 25, son of Ghulam Mustafa Khoso, was seized from the suspects.

He said the woman, Saiqa Rasheed Khoso, 18, was strangled to death.

The police officer said that according to the preliminary investigation, Rasheed Ahmed Khoso, and his two brothers, Sadiq Khoso and Ishaq Khoso, along with their cousin, Saifullah, told the police that they found Ghulam Shabbir Khoso and Saiqa Khoso in a highly objectionable position.

It was stated that Rasheed Khoso grabbed his wife and strangled her to death in a fit of anger. The suspects also axed Ghulam Shabbir Khoso to death.

SHO Malik Hidayatullah said that the bodies were taken to the Liaquat University Hospital for a post-mortem examination and then handed over to the heirs.

He said all four suspects and the crime weapon were taken in custody. He said that suspects and Ghulam Khoso, labourers by profession, were related to each other.

He said Ghulam Khoso, a resident of Landhi village of Nawabshah (Shaheed Benazirabad district) was also a relative of the woman victim. He had come to the brick kiln house of the suspects on Friday on a routine visit, he added.

According to the police, Rasheed Khoso and Saiqa Khoso wedded some five months back and lived at the house owned by Haji Zareef Khan Pathan.

Meanwhile, Abdul Sami Khoso, the brother of Ghulam Shabbir Khoso, told the police that his slain brother had an altercation with Rasheed Khoso some time ago and this might be the motive for his murder. He said the suspects killed him and the woman on the pretext of Karo-kari (an old custom under which a person found indulging in an extramarital affair is liable to be killed by his/her close relatives or the affected family).

The SHO said that an FIR of the double-murder was yet to be registered.

‘Encounter’

The Hatri police have claimed to have gunned down a hardened criminal carrying a head-money of Rs1 million in an encounter with him and his associates at Sadique Leuna Housing Scheme in the early hours of Saturday.

Hyderabad SSP Irfan Ali Baloch told a press conference in his office that Ahmed Machhi, was wanted by police in over 50 cases of heinous crimes registered against him at various police stations.

Acting upon a tip-off about his presence in the area, a police team rushed to the specified spot and ordered Machhi and his gangsters to surrender themselves before the police, he said, adding that the gangsters responded with a heavy gunfire which was returned.

After the encounter, Ahmed Machhi, son of Mehmood Machhi, was found dead, the SSP claimed. He said Machhi’s two associates, Mohammad Ali Halepoto and Imdad Khokhar aka Fauji, managed to flee. A Kalashnikov and its bullets were seized from the deceased suspect, he said.Machhi was a resident of a village in the Shadi Khan area of Naushahro Feroze district, the police said.

‘Army to train new police force’

The SSP also told reporters that the Army would train an anti-terrorist force (ATF) comprising police personnel.

It would be a a ‘counter-terrorism’ force and was being raised by the police department, he said. In the first phase, the Army would provide a week-long anti-terror training to a batch of 60 policemen.

About a plan for security of private schools evolved in the wake of the Dec 16 carnage at the Army Public School in Peshawar, the SSP said he held a meeting with owners of several private schools and asked them to arrange for private security guards and ensure more than one or two entry/exit points at each school and provide training to their staff and students to meet any eventuality.

Daily Dawn

Gender discrimination, low wages irk female labourers

By Muhammad Sadaqat

HARIPUR: Industrial workers, mainly women, are exposed to difficult working conditions which are detrimental to their well-being and could prevent them from contributing to the national economy.

This was said by speakers while addressing the Women Workers Convention arranged by the Rural Development Project (RDP) in Haripur on Thursday. The event was attended by factory owners, industrial workers, teachers and home-based workers.

During the convention, industrial workers and teachers shared concerns about their working conditions.

Tahira Bibi, an industrial worker, said many women face gender discrimination and are paid below the minimum wage.

“We have also been deprived of ESSI, EOBI and other facilities which we are entitled to under labour laws,” she stated. ESSI is the Employee Social Security Institution while EOBI is a body that provides old age benefits.

Another industrial worker, Mukhtiar Bibi, claimed there are no separate toilets and changing rooms for women at the factory she works for.

“There are also very few transport facilities made available to women who live far away from the factory,” she added.

According to Shah Bibi, women are paid between Rs6,000 to Rs8,000 a month rather than the minimum wage of Rs15,000.

“Our employers force us to declare that we are paid Rs12,000 whenever a labour department official visits our factory,” she said.

Wage discrimination

Speaking on the occasion, Akhtar Jan, a teacher at a private school in Haripur, drew attention to gender discrimination faced by women teachers.

“A woman teacher with an undergraduate or postgraduate qualification is paid Rs1,000 to Rs2,000,” she said. “However, they are forced to declare that they are paid Rs10,000 every month.”

According to Jan, teachers who question this practice are sacked immediately.

The fight for rights

RDP executive director Muhammad Ahsan Khan said the laws dealing with the rights of women in the workplace need to be implemented in letter and spirit.

“If the laws are insufficient, they should be revamped and made compatible to international laws and the needs of workers,” said Muhammad Ahsan.

According to Sadaqat Khan, a rights activist, said women workers contribute 23% of the country’s GDP.

Speaking on the occasion, Qamar Hayat, the executive director of SAHARA Foundation, said women workers must be made aware of their labour rights.

“The government should consult workers and submit recommendations for new labour policy,” he added.

Express Tribune

Man knocks at apex court’s door to get daughter back from Jamia Hafsa

By: Ikram Junaidi

ISLAMABAD: The man who alleged that his daughter is being held in Jamia Hafsa, the women’s seminary in Lal Masjid, filed an appeal with the Human Rights Cell of the Supreme Court on Monday in hopes of having his daughter recovered.

Abdul Qayyum’s lawyer Muhammad Haider Imtiaz told Dawn that Mr Qayyum has requested the Supreme Court to take suo motu notice of his plight and ensure the recovery of his daughter. Court officials have accepted his request and promised to respond to the request in a few days.

He said Lal Masjid cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz has been using his influence to prevent him from getting his daughter out of the seminary. He expressed his faith in the Supreme Court and said he hoped that his daughter will soon be recovered.

Know more: Distraught man claims daughter being ‘held’ in Jamia Hafsa

In his application to the court, Mr Qayyum stated that his 26-year-old daughter Uzma was a final year student of a religious course in Jamia Binaat-i-Ayesha madressah in Muslim Town, Rawalpindi, when on June 16, 2014 she did not return home from the seminary in the evening.

Supreme Court has promised to respond in the coming days
Mr Qayyum said he approached the administration of Jamia Binaat-i-Ayesha and they informed him that she had left for home after class and they were unaware of her whereabouts. The girl’s friends told him that she had left for Jamia Hafsa in Islamabad.

“I was further informed that she was accompanied by a woman named Umme Hassan, wife of Maulana Abdul Aziz. Umme Hassan had been visiting Jamia Binaat-i-Ayesha regularly and been in touch with my daughter since 2013. She had been patronising her and urging her to enroll at Jamia Hafsa,” he said.

Mr Qayyum said that the next morning i.e June 17, 2014 he along with his wife and son, visited Jamia Hafsa where they met Uzma in the presence of Umme Hassan and two other women staff members of the seminary. Upon seeing her family, Uzma started crying but did not say anything.

Mr Qayyum said he told Umme Hassan that they wanted to take their daughter home but she refused and said she had dedicated her life to the ‘cause of Islam’.

“We were surprised to hear this as Uzma had never disclosed any such intentions to us before,” he said.

“We insisted that she be allowed to return home, but Umme Hassan refused and told us to come again the next day and meet her husband, Maulana Abdul Aziz,” Mr Qayyum said in the application.

When he, along with his wife and son, again visited Jamia Hafsa and met Maulana Abdul Aziz, he said: “The Maulana told us that Uzma did not wish to return home, that she was in safe hands and that there was no need for us to visit her anymore.

“This statement came as an absolute shock to us. I told the Maulana that being Uzma’s father, I could not leave her in the presence of ‘na-mehrams’ (unrelated persons) but all in vain,” he said.

Afterwards, he said he repeatedly attempted to get his daughter back but Jamia Hafsa management did not allow her to leave. Mr Qayyum said he also tried to wed his daughter to her fiancé Muhammad Imran but again he was not allowed to do so.

Mr Qayyum said in his application that on July 3, 2014, he approached the Commissioner of Islamabad and the police and was told to appear in court before Magistrate First Class Kamran Cheema.

The next day the court ordered that Uzma be sent to Dar-ul-Aman, a government refuge for distressed women, in Rawalpindi’s Shamsabad locality, for three days and directed the police to bring her before the court again.

But on the appointed date of July 7, the magistrate was on leave. He heard the case on his return on July 9 in his chamber, said Mr Qayyum.

While the parents sat in the courtroom, the magistrate ordered that Uzma be sent to Jamia Hafsa.

Extremely perturbed by the course of events, the father said: “We approached various Ulema, including Mufti Taqi Usmani, and requested them to intervene in the matter. Those who responded to our requests displayed their inability to persuade Maulana Abdul Aziz and Umme Hassan in this regard.”

“We also learnt from various sources that the administration of Jamia Hafsa brainwashes young, impressionable girls studying in various seminaries with the aim to convincing them to join Jamia Hafsa so that they can be used for the purposes of furthering the extremist agendas of Maulana Abdul Aziz and Umme Hassan, and their organisation – the Shuhada Foundation,” he said.

Rejecting the allegations at the time they were first made, Umme Hassan had hinted to Dawn that it was a case of Uzma running away from a forced marriage. She had also said that in the statement Uzma gave to the magistrate she had said that she did not want to return to her family.

Daily Dawn

Acid attack victim dies at hospital

MULTAN: A 20-year-old woman died in intensive care at Nishtar Medical Hospital on Saturday after she was attacked with acid.

Police said Javeda Bibi, a resident of Shujabad, had married 26-year-old Amjad, a daily wage worker, two years ago.

They said her brother Akhtar, 23, was married to Amjad’s 21-year-old sister Khursheeda.

They said Akhtar divorced his wife a year after their marriage. They said Amjad then divorced Javeda.

Police said Javeda was married to another labourer, Riaz, six months after her divorce.

They said Amjad had told Javeda not to marry Riaz and threatened to harm her if she did.

“On December 6, Amjad and his two unidentified accomplices forced their way into Riaz’s home. They beat up Javeda and then poured a jug of acid on her. She was taken to Shujaabad Tehsil Headquarters Hospital from where she was referred to Nisthar Hospital in Multan,” police said. She was pronounced dead on Saturday by doctors.

Police said they had arrested Amjad and one of his accomplices on December 8.

Express Tribune

Protest over raid, detention of women, children

SANGHAR: A large number of Nareja community members held a demonstration and sit-in outside the local press club on Thursday against police excesses.

They claimed that a joint team comprising Sanghar and Khairpur police personnel raided a house in Ghulshan Kamal Khan village and took away 10 women and their children, as well as cattle head and household articles without assigning any reason.

When contacted, local police officials declined to comment on the alleged police action.

During their five-hour protest, they said that police in plain clothes targeted the families and assets of Aziz Narejo, a milk seller, and his close relative, Muharrum Narejo.

Muhram Narejo said that his mother, wife and sister-in-law were among those taken away by the police, who rode to the village in two cars and forced the women and children into a truck. They also loaded household articles and animals onto the same truck, he added.

The protesters placed burning tyres along Sanghar-Mirpurkhas road to disrupt vehicular traffic before a local PPP activist, Abid Farooq, held negotiations with them and persuaded them to end their agitation.

Dawn News