BAHAWALNAGAR: A former station house officer (SHO) and nine other policemen of Madrasa police were booked for “negligence and misuse of authority” after allegedly shooting a pregnant woman dead and injuring her husband during a ‘police encounter’ on March 25.

According to the complainant, a relatively “mild” case was registered against the SHO and others under section 155-c of the Police Order, instead of booking the policemen on murder charges.

They action was taken against the police officials after they were found guilty of “wrongdoing, negligence and misuse of authority” in an inquiry held on the orders of Punjab inspector general of police (IGP).

A three-month pregnant woman, Shabana, was allegedly shot by the policemen when she was going to buy medicines for her mother-in-law with her husband, who was also injured in the “encounter”.

Complainant seeks murder case against suspects

The woman succumbed to her bullet wounds within a few hours of being shot by police, after being admitted at the local district headquarters hospital. However, she held the police responsible for the incident in a video statement recorded before she died.

On the other hand, to justify their action, police not only booked the deceased woman, but also her husband, Shabbir, brother-in-law Dilgeer, along with two others, in a mobile snatching case. The police had also refused to hand over the body of Shabana to her family and buried the body declaring it “unclaimed” on March 26, the complainant, Faryad Ali (70), father of Shabbir, said.

Following the incident, Faryad Ali, along with locals, staged a protest against the police, holding SHO Matlub, SI Shukat Ali, and other police officials responsible for the “fake encounter”.

The protesters alleged that the couple was murdered at the behest of an influential family who had occupied the family’s three-kanal commercial property. They alleged the land grabbers were being patronised by a former DPO.

On March 26, Bahawalnagar DPO ordered Investigation SP to inquire into the viral videos of the deceased woman’s dying declaration and police firing.

The Bahawalpur regional police officer (RPO) also ordered the Investigation SP and SP RIB Arslan Wahid to probe the matter, on the instruction of the IGP on March 27.

On March 29, the DPO suspended SHO Matlub from service and ordered transfers of the 10 police officials in the raiding team, after they were found guilty of negligence in the initial investigation conducted by Investigation SP, Bahawalnagar.

On April 12, SP RIB also held 10 officials of Madrasa police station, including SHO Matlub, responsible for all that happened on March 25 and instructed the district police to take legal action against them.

Reacting to the decision, Faryad Ali said that despite sufficient evidence of the police shooting the couple and killing an innocent woman, the department had booked the suspects under a “minor” section (155) instead of registering a murder case against them.

He said the police officials were still threatening to kill his sons Dilgeer (18), who was in illegal police confinement since the day of the incident, if the case was not withdrawn.

Faryad alleged the sitting SHO, Muzaffar, was also forcing him to record statements in favour of the accused police officials.

SHO Muzaffar, however, denied the allegations leveled by Faryad.

When some audio recordings of SHO Muzaffar’s talk with Faryad were shared with Bahawalnagar DPO, he said that he was going to launch an inquiry and would award an exemplary punishment to the SHO if he was found guilty in the probe.

Published in Dawn, April 14th, 2022