KARACHI, June 8: Having endured severe brutality and threats, relatives of a woman kidnapped by a landlord have fled their home in Jati, Thatta, and have taken refuge in the Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum’s (PFF) Ibrahim Hyderi office.
Rehmat and Sukkan, mother and sister of the kidnapped woman Khattu Mallah, claim that the kidnapping was carried out on Jati’s main road by landlord Siddiq Jat and his accomplices.
Asking the provincial government and human rights organisations for help in Khattu’s recovery, they say that the police in their area are indifferent to their plight.
Sukkan told Dawn that the family had gone to the bus stop with Khattu and her nine-month-old infant, who were returning to Khattu’s husband in Matli.
“We were near the bus stop when eight men in auto-rickshaws opened fire on us,” said Sukkan.
“A bullet hit Khattu in the leg and Jat grabbed the infant and threw him on the road. A bullet hit my younger sister also while my mother and I were pushed to the ground.” She said that she and Rehmat were beaten and “brutally tortured” by the men, while Khattu was tied up, shoved into a rickshaw and taken away.
She said that the police were informed immediately and chased the kidnappers but were then bribed into inaction. Sukkan added that subsequently, policemen abused her family and beat them up when they asked for action to be taken against the alleged kidnapper.
Furthermore, she said that the FIR registered by the Jati police did not name any of the alleged kidnappers, whereas many eyewitnesses were available.
According to the kidnapped woman’s mother Rehmat, this is the second time Khattu has been kidnapped by Jat. “Two years ago, he kept her for two months during which time she was beaten, drugged and raped many times,” said Rehmat. Khattu was freed following the intervention of another landlord approached by the family, and she married a wood labourer in Matli soon afterwards.
“It was the first time she came to see us after her marriage,” said the visibly distressed mother. “Had we known that Jat still had a grudge against us, we would never have asked her to come.”
The family was forced to leave their ancestral town because Jat threatened that more girls of their family would meet Khattu’s fate if they pursued the case. Sukkan and Rehmat named Siddiq Jat, Musa, Hasan, Sharif, Sajjan, Haji Guddu (all belonging to the Jat caste), Billo Thaheem, Ali Ghulam Sakhero, Haji Jumman and Mukhtiarkar Zulfiqar Mangrio in Khattu’s kidnapping. They further alleged that Jat had been involved in other cases of murder and kidnapping as well, but no action had ever been taken against him.
Soon after Khattu’s kidnapping, the case was taken up by the PFF and demonstrations were staged in Matli.
Senior vice-chairperson of the PFF Tahira Ali said that further demonstrations would be held in Karachi and Matli. She commented that while cases of karo kari and kidnapping were common across Sindh, they were unusual in the fishing communities where men and women worked alongside each other.
KARACHI, June 8: Having endured severe brutality and threats, relatives of a woman kidnapped by a landlord have fled their home in Jati, Thatta, and have taken refuge in the Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum’s (PFF) Ibrahim Hyderi office.
