Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: A teenager allegedly burnt alive for refusing a marriage offer actually committed suicide, police said on Friday, in a statement slammed by a prominent rights activist and the girl’s father.

The death of 19-year-old Maria Sadaqat made international headlines after claims that she was tortured then set alight for refusing the proposal. She was said to have been attacked by a group of people near the summer hill resort of Murree, outside the capital Islamabad, in late May, and died several days later.

At the time police said she gave a statement before she died naming the man who had allegedly proposed, as well as his father, among others as her attackers.

But on Friday police discounted her dying words, claiming Sadaqat and the man had been in a “relationship” for years and that in thousands of text messages exchanged between the pair she had begged him to marry her. She had also warned in a text message that he would be held responsible for her suicide, officials said.

The petrol used to set her alight, police added, came from her father’s workshop, and no forensic evidence supported the claim that she had been attacked. Investigation head Abubakar Khudabaksh confirmed the report. But the girl’s father accused the police of manipulating the investigation.

“This is very disturbing and shocking that the police are changing the facts and manipulating the investigation in the favour of the accused party,” Sadaqat Hussain said. “We are poor. What can we do?”

Women’s rights activist and lawyer Asma Jehangir, who has formed a committee to examine the incident, also rejected the report. “This case does not appear to be a suicide. (The) girl’s hands were not burnt,” she said. “And if she wanted to commit suicide she would have swallowed some poison or shot herself instead of putting herself in such pain and agony,” she continued.