Daily Times

KARACHI: Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) chairman Bilawal Bhutto Zardari on Saturday asked the Sindh government to expedite investigations into the rape and murder of a nine-year-old girl in Larkana and ensure that culprits were punished.

Bilawal asked Home Minister Sohail Anwar Siyal to supervise the process and to get regular updates about the investigations so that justice was provided to the victim’s family.

The PPP chairman further said that such horrendous incidents must be strongly condemned, and necessary steps taken to protect girls from falling prey to such incidents.

Meanwhile, The police have arrested some suspects and are conducting DNA tests to find the culprits.

The minor was killed and dumped in a sewage drain after allegedly being raped in Larkana district. The body of S*, daughter of a labourer, who went missing on Tuesday, was found in the pond near Tayyab Hotel along Dodai Road on Wednesday morning.

The father told the media that his daughter had left home in Ayub Colony area on Tuesday night to buy sweets but did not return. “We searched for her in the neighbourhood and at the houses of relatives and neighbours for hours but could not find her.”

Six suspects have been arrested so far. The parents of the minor girl have been demanding the constitution of a medical board. “The police are trying to protect rapists and murderers,” the minor’s father told the media, demanding immediate arrest of the culprits.

Later, a complaint of the missing child was registered with the Haideri police station. The father blamed the police for delaying the search for the child. “She might have been alive today if the police had immediately started the search.”

SHO Aslam Pervez Abro said the police were informed about the abandoned body by a passer-by. “There were marks of torture on her face. We are awaiting the medical report to establish rape,” he added. SHO Abro informed the local media that so far the police were clueless about the culprit and they were using sniffer dogs to trace the perpetrator.

The body was moved to Chandka Medical Hospital where the family complained that the postmortem took around six hours as the doctor concerned was not available.

Published in Daily Times, April 29^th 2018.