RAWALPINDI: Six railway policemen were arrested on murder charge on Wednesday after they allegedly tortured to death a train passenger travelling to Rawalpindi overnight.

“They kicked and punched my brother and then madly hit him with their belts and butts of rifles for not vacating his seat for their guests,” Naseem Akhtar Khan, who was travelling with the victim, Muhammad Saleem Khan, told Dawn.

“They stopped only when Saleem, a man in his 40s, started bleeding profusely from the nose and mouth.”

Superintendent Railway Police Riaz Ahmad said preliminary investigation and postmortem report confirmed that Saleem Khan suffered torture.

Saleem was returning to his job as a driver in the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission after celebrating Eidul Azha with his parents and relatives in Mianwali. But the 127-Up Mehr Express that he boarded for Rawalpindi late Tuesday brought him dead.

Saleem Khan has left his wife, two daughters and two sons to grieve his unfortunate death.

His brother said Saleem was sleeping when a group of railway police guards entered the compartment and asked him to vacate his seat for their guests. “After some arguments, they pounced upon him and beat him up with increasing ferocity. Nobody dared to stop them,” he said.

But when the attackers saw their victim bleeding and going limp, they stopped and tried to make up with him. “But how could I pardon them when my poor brother was dying of their brutality,” said Naseem.

“How can I forget those moments when my brother was killed by the very protectors of law and everybody watched helplessly,” he said.

SP Railway Riaz Ahmed told Dawn it was about 1:30am Wednesday when the fracas started.

“First some hot words were exchanged over the demand for vacating the seat and then the policemen went physically after the passenger.”

Some passengers tried to calm down the railway police guards but in vain.

An inquiry team constituted under Deputy Inspector General of Police Sharik Kamal investigated the incident.

Its preliminary report, confirming that the policemen had tortured the passenger, has been submitted to the Inspector General of Police, the officer said.

It also emerged from the investigation that the torturers kept on trying for a “patch up” with the grieving brother till the train reached Rawalpindi railway station.

SP Riaz said six railway police officers and guards, sub-inspector Abdul Latif, head constable Liaquat Ali and constables Wasim Abbas, Ameer Hamza, Muhammad Rafiq and Nasir Masih were arrested after a murder case was registered against them.

On their part the accused policemen claimed that passenger Saleem Khan died of heart attack but his physique and condition belied the claim.

Senior railway police collected evidence and interviewed some of the passengers travelling in the compartment.

According to preliminary postmortem report, wounds on the head of victim Saleem Khan had appeared to have been caused by batons. There were other torture marks on his body. The final postmortem report is yet to be completed.

Published in Dawn, October 9th, 2014