Daily Times

As the dust of social media storm begins to settle and police investigation inches towards its conclusion, the high-profile case of alleged murder of National University of Modern Languages (NUML) student and a part-time employee of Pakistan Red Crescent Society – Kainat Tariq – turns out to be a ‘suicide triggered by a history of disturbed personal and family life of the deceased girl’.

“Despite a comprehensive investigation by different units of police department spanning over days, so far no incriminating evidence has been found against PRCS Secretary General Khalid bin Majeed,” a senior police official directly involved in investigation of the case told Daily Times on the condition of anonymity. “All allegations leveled by Kainat’s father in his application to the police are proving unsubstantive,” he further said. “It is quite interesting to note that Kainat called Khalid on his cell phone at around 5:30pm on the day of incident to seek help after taking poisonous pills. Can anyone call his murderer for help, if the murder allegations of Kainat’s father are taken as correct?” he questioned. “We have almost come to the conclusion that it is a case of suicide, not murder,” he went on to say.

The I-9 Industrial Area Police had registered a murder case on the complaint of Muhammad Tariq, father of deceased Kainat Tariq, who in his written application had alleged that his daughter had been murdered by the secretary general of PRCS by poisoning her. After registering the FIR based on the charges leveled by father of the deceased, the I-9 police had detained Khalid for investigation, and he is still in police custody.

Sources told Daily Times that in her dying statement to an attending paramedic at the Holy Family Hospital of Rawalpindi on November 23, Kainat herself confessed that she had bought the poisonous pills from a shop in Tramarri Chowk in Islamabad and consumed those out of her own free will and under no pressure.

Police later recovered purchase receipt and packing of those pills from a drawer of Kainat’s office table at the PRCS. An investigation officer of I-9 Police Station cross-checked and the shop owner in Tramarri Chowk also confirmed that the lady had come to his shop alone and bought the pills on the pretext of putting those in wheat grain to protect that from the insects.

Police sources told Daily Times that the allegation regarding the accused’s secret marriage with Kainat also proved wrong. The allegations about Kainat’s salary and UK visit also fell flat as the relevant documentary evidence collected by police spoke otherwise.

A little digging in personal and family history of Kainat revealed that she had been through traumatic times in the recent years. Her father divorced her mother several years back and both of them married of their own choice later. Kainat was brought up by her grandparents and for some time, she lived with her uncle. She left her uncle’s home in 2016 for facing continuous slander and disrespect there and took refuge in Darul Amman in Lahore where she submitted an affidavit, available with Daily Times, narrating the reason behind abandoning her uncle’s home and seeking shelter at Darul Amman.

When approached, a senior official at PRCS told this scribe on the condition of anonymity that the factor of ‘conspiracy’ in this case cannot be completely overlooked. “The secretary general could be a victim of dirty office politics,” he opined. “Since taking over as secretary general two years back, he introduced a lot of reforms and also extensively worked for the development and betterment of the organisation as well as its employees. Recently, he was also elected as co-chair of the Global Committee on Covid-19 Vaccination and Resource Mobilisation, of which 192 countries of the world are members. This is a huge honour for Pakistan as well as the PRCS but some people within the organisation apparently could not swallow his achievements,” he claimed. “Let the inquiry complete and everything will come out crystal clear,” he maintained.