The officer also boasts a track record of torture with at least two different FIRs registered against him in Mansehra last year and he had been demoted to the rank of ASI. PHOTO: WASEEM NAZIR/EXPRESS
HARIPUR: A man set himself on fire to protest the detention of his teenage son by the Kot Najubullah police in Haripur.
Speaking at a news conference at Tehsil Municipal Authority (TMA) Chaman Park on Saturday, Ghulam Muhammad, a resident of Mirpur Choeeyan village, accompanied by some of his relatives, said Kot Najibullah police had raided his house on September 14 and asked for his 17-year-old son Muhammad Naeem. He said the police party said they wanted Naeem for an enquiry into a criminal case.
“Since he was in Rawalpindi for a family matter at that time, I promised to take him to the police station myself and I did that the same evening when he returned,” Muhammad told the media. He added that Naeem was handed over to SHO Sajid Farooq who promised to send him back shortly. However when Naeem did not return home for the next two days, a concerned Muhammad went to the police station to get his son back. But officials there told him that the teenager was being questioned over a robbery in a neighbouring village. They further told him that Naeem will be detained for some time.
“When I went to the police station on the fourth day, the SHO refused to let my son go again, forcing me to file a habeas corpus petition with the Haripur district court,” he lamented. The distraught father added that when the court sent a bailiff to the Kot Najibullah police station to determine Naeem’s status, the SHO denied that the teenager had been arrested or was detained at the precinct.
Riaz, one of Naeem’s relatives, told the media that Muhammad was so traumatised by the incident that he attempted suicide by setting himself on fire. Fortunately, he was rescued by his family, suffering only minor burn injuries to his back.
Muhammad and other villagers now fear that the police may have subjected Naeem to torture and demanded that the Peshawar High Court chief justice and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa IG to determine the juvenile’s whereabouts punish those responsible for his prolonged detention.
When approached, the Kot Najibullah police denied the arrest and detention of Naeem. However, soon after the news conference, the police officials said Naeem had been arrested and was in police remand for investigation into a robbery.
Fuel to fire
Meanwhile, former police official Javed Aslam, a resident of the same village, also accused the Kot Najibullah police of illegally detaining his minor son Ahsan Javed.
Speaking on the occasion, Aslam said the same police party barged into his house on the second day of Eidul Azha, beat the women in his house, tore their clothes and took his son to the police station.
He claimed that Ahsan, a student of class nine, was being detained illegally.
The Kot Najibullah police told The Express Tribune that Ahsan has not been arrested nor was he detained illegally.
It may be added that Kot Najibullah SHO had been suspended after he was posted in the city following complaints of a similar nature a few years ago. However, the complainant Raja Habib Aalam withdrew his complaint against the SHO owing to social pressure.
The officer also boasts a track record of torture with at least two different FIRs registered against him in Mansehra last year and he had been demoted to the rank of ASI.
Published in The Express Tribune, September 25th, 2016.
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